


Forceless

by squire



Category: Star Wars Episode VII: The Force Awakens (2015)
Genre: Angst, Body Horror, Canon Typical Violence, Defecting from the First Order, Denial of Feelings, Developing Relationship, Enemies to Lovers, First Kiss, First Time, Hurt/Comfort, Huxlolidays, Love Confessions, M/M, Minor Character Death, Miscommunication, Slow Burn, Space Battles, TFA-canon compliant, Transformation, Unresolved Sexual Tension, survival thriller
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-07-01
Updated: 2017-08-29
Packaged: 2018-11-22 02:31:16
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 31
Words: 49,421
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11370729
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/squire/pseuds/squire
Summary: Ren has lost the one thing that defined him from before he was even born.Somehow this results in a mad dash through the Galaxy, with more bloodshed that two men should be able to bring on, and with one happy ending under a starry canopy of a summer night.





	1. Are We There Yet?

**Author's Note:**

> Wrangling all the Huxlolidays prompts into a comprehensive and even remotely logical story arc had been fun. I hope you enjoy as much as I did :)

The autopilot cycled a set of binary lines down the screen, over and over, the steady blinking soothing Hux’s mind almost like a lullaby. Coordinates, hyperspace jump trajectory calculations, cross-checking with sector maps, and all over again. The miniature processor heart didn’t care for the turmoil the shuttle narrowly escaped. Its flawless algorithms didn’t stop for one moment to wallow in misery and heartsickness. Uncomprehending and unbothered by human weaknesses, the computer carried on in piloting their shuttle to their destination: Snoke’s planet. 

The hyperlight kaleidoscope coalesced into narrow lines that abruptly shortened into mere points. The jump out of hyperspace jostled Hux in his seat. He didn’t even realize he was dozing off. How many hours was it since - since he last had a proper sleep? He was sleep-deprived long before the order to destroy the Ileenium system came. That alone seemed like a distant point in history now. 

A groan and a muffled whimper from the back compartment told Hux that someone else has also been awoken from their undeserved slumber. _A couple more hours,_ he thought with dark satisfaction, _a couple more hours of suffering and then I’ll never have to see your face again._  

But for now, he had to make sure said face remained in the best possible shape to be presented to Supreme Leader. With a suppressed groan of his own, Hux reluctantly abandoned the pilot seat and went to the back to check on Kylo Ren’s healing progress. 

Predictably, the beaten Knight had done away with the bacta patches yet again. Hux was growing tired of this. Luckily, the scar was similarly growing closed, despite Ren’s efforts. Even though Hux had to take somewhat drastic measures to ensure Ren left the wound alone for long enough. 

“Came to stun me into obedience again, General?” 

Hux merely looked over the scar - now a thin, but definitely there line bisecting Ren’s right cheek and his eyebrow. It was a small wonder he still had both eyes. It was also a shame that he only used them to glower - never to see and observe. 

Hux showed him his empty hands to drive the point home. “If you wouldn’t try to bite the hand that feeds you,” he remarked, rummaging through their food supplies, “or, in this case, tries to keep you alive… in my defence, you did try to kill me when I first approached you.” 

“I fully intend to remedy that,” Ren growled. Hux only scoffed. Threats of harm, promises of long and torturous death - another recurring theme of this trip. But for all Ren’s glowering and venomous looks, the threats and promises remained empty. Interestingly empty… 

“I like to think you’ve actually welcomed the unconsciousness,” he straightened, sneering down on Ren’s hunched form. “A mighty Force user like you cannot deflect a blaster bolt? I’ve seen you freeze them in the air, Ren. Don’t try to raise sympathies pretending to be the helpless victim.” 

To his faint surprise, Ren didn’t seize his throat in a bruising Force grip. He didn’t even lash out to struck him the old-fashioned way. All the Knight seemed to do was curl on himself tighter. Was it a trick of the shuttle’s reduced lighting or was he always this deathly pale? 

“You should rest some more,” Hux found himself saying. “Supreme Leader wants you alive and hale.” 

“Are we there yet?” And now the Knight looked definitely pale, whiter than Starkiller’s snow. “I felt the shuttle leave hyperspace...” 

“It’s been a mid-jump,” Hux rolled his eyes. As if he was that stupid to bee-line it straight to Snoke’s location, right after barely making it out of Starkiller’s wreckage. No, he had to cover their track, and he did it with care. 

Finalizer was still holding up against the swarming Resistance fighters when Hux had to leave the battlefield with orders to bring Kylo Ren to his master. She was a tough ship, the best of her class. Hux had full faith that once this uncomfortable delivery duty was over, there would be a ship and a command to come back to. 

“Oh,” Ren blinked several times, very fast. “How many more?” 

“Can’t you tell?” Hux snapped. This childish questioning was grating at his nerves. “Can’t you sense your master through the Force or something?” 

Hux was so absorbed in his own angry thoughts that he almost missed the muttered reply: “... can’t.” 

“What?” 

“I can’t. I can’t access the Force.” Ren was shaking now - Hux instinctively gripped the water bottle to protect it from spilling when he realised nothing else was shaking. No Force destruction surrounding Ren as it always did during his emotional outbursts. Just him. On the verge of emotional breakdown. 

“I can’t - not since I reached out for the lightsaber and _she_ got it instead. It’s gone. I don’t know how - I tried - I tried _pain_ , but it didn’t work - nothing works.” 

Hux never understood the Force nonsense. And for the first time in their acquaintance, it seemed that Kylo Ren didn’t either. 

“Does Snoke know?” 

“ _I don’t know!_ ” Ren shouted. “How am I supposed to– I can’t feel him anywhere–” 

“Calm down, you idiot,” Hux said unthinkingly. His brain had apparently already gotten used to the freedom of speaking without the risk of being choked. “If he’s so powerful, he can still feel you.” 

“You don’t understand,” Ren kept shaking his head like a badly wired doll. “I’ve _always_ felt him. He was… he _was always there._ ” 

He sounded like a child, miserable over the loss of their oldest toy - no, that was wrong, Hux mentally corrected himself, the child bit was right but the crying wasn’t over a loss of a toy… more like over a loss of a parent. 

Hux took a deep breath. Again. And again, until the image of gray rain was pushed from the forefront of his mind back into the limbo where it belonged. 

“It surely isn’t permanent.” 

“And if it is?” Well, how in hells was Hux supposed to know? 

“I am sure your usefulness to Supreme Leader is greater than to be negated with a single loss.” 

With that, Hux escaped back into the cockpit before he would be forced into showing any more kindness he did not feel. Despite the swiftness of his retreat, his own words haunted him. 

How useful was _he_ to Snoke? Starkiller was his greatest accomplishment - did _Hux_ have any merit without it?  

Anyone could have delivered Kylo Ren to Snoke. It didn’t have to be the actual commander of the very ship capable of dealing the Resistance a swift counterattack. Not unless… 

Snoke wanted to make an example of them both. 

Ren probably knew it. Even without feeling him through the Force, he must have known the way Snoke’s mind worked. He was terrified and helpless. 

Well then. Hux might have been terrified too. But he was far from helpless. 

He switched off the autopilot and keyed in a fresh set of coordinates. 


	2. Did you put your sunscreen on/Did you take your rubber ring?

Ren staggered out of his den to join Hux in the cockpit just as the shuttle jumped out of hyperspace one last time. 

“This… is not Snoke’s planet.” 

“Oh, _now_ you can tell?” Hux was carefully navigating them to a less used orbit where they would have a better chance of slipping through the planetary defences undetected and unquestioned. He wished now their shuttle didn’t scream _military command_ to anyone close enough to get a clear visual but there was little he could do about it now. They would have to get a more inconspicuous means of transportation once they got safely onto the surface. 

“General, what have you done?” 

Hux was about to retort something about Ren picking his brain for answers when he abruptly remembered that Ren couldn’t. Oh great. 

“Your… powers might return - or not,” he began explaining, ignoring Ren’s flinch at the words, “but I am not letting Snoke make a scapegoat of me for _your_ mistakes. You can crawl back under his foot if you want but you’re doing that on your own.” 

“This is treason.” 

“This is survival,” Hux corrected him. 

“Maybe he would spare me if I delivered to him the traitor _you_ ’ve become,” Ren said in a low voice. 

Hux spared him a single glance - noting the lack of a weapon, his crude lightsaber lost on Starkiller, all the shuttle’s weaponry locked and coded by Hux himself, Ren’s shallow breathing and white lips pressed together with the pain still wracking his body. The wound in his side and his mangled shoulder would need much longer time to heal than the face. 

“Right, because you’re _so_ fit to fight me in your state.” 

Silence filled the cockpit, thick like the clouds that enveloped them as soon as they entered lower atmosphere. Ren’s attention was gradually drawn by the navigational screen. 

“Are we on New Republic territory?” 

“Technically. Arkanis never held much love for Republican rule, just as the Republic never cared for Outer Rim worlds.” 

“But if there are First Order sympathisants here, they could report–” 

“There’s nobody where I am taking us,” Hux cut him off, tone harsher than he intended. “Not anymore,” he sighed just for himself. 

Drizzle clung to the shuttle’s viewports in thousands of water droplets. Short and unpredictable gusts of wind stirred the upper levels of clouds, making a safe descend a tricky business. 

“This was your homeworld.” 

Hux was so busy piloting that he nearly missed Ren’s observation, spoken quietly almost as an afterthought. When it registered, he nearly bit through his own tongue. His personal details were classified information. Were Ren’s powers returning? 

There was almost - a haughty, and more than a little smug smile playing around Ren’s lips when he looked at him. Hux instantly berated himself for his over-reaction. Mind powers or not, Ren could still read him, especially when his nerves were too frazzled to leave him anything but an open book. 

“It’s your accent,” Ren explained. “You usually speak like an old Imperial… but something about this place is making you slip.” 

Hux scowled and returned his attention to the helm. Time and time again, he would forget that Ren was raised a child of a diplomat. Quick to notice frivolous details. 

“Homeworld, but hardly a home,” Hux said eventually just for the sake of speaking and drowning out the unspoken words that seemed to fill the cockpit, oozing through the cracks of the tension between them. 

“I was four when we were forced to evacuate. My home was onboard of a starship ever since.” 

“And thirty years later, you’re about to set foot on a planet with a sun you can’t drain and kill,” Ren was grinning now, dark and manic. “I hope you packed enough sunscreen to cover your–” 

The slap rang out in the narrow cockpit with a surprisingly loud _crack_. Hux’s palm burned even through the leather of his glove but it was nothing compared with the rage burning under his skin, so, so close to breaking through. Hand-shaped red mark blossomed on Ren’s cheek, glowing brighter by the second. Hux squeezed his eyes tightly shut and concentrated on breathing. 

Starkiller, his beloved weapon, now reduced to ashes and a joke fodder for this _idiot_ who directly caused its downfall– 

“General,” through the haze of fury, Hux became aware that Ren was speaking. Something somewhere was also beeping, a shrill sound that could only mean trouble. 

“The landing thrusters are out,” or so it seemed from the confusing error messages of the shuttle systems. They had been hit a couple of times before they could make their escape from Resistance fighters but Hux was able to patch it up and so far, there wasn’t any damage on anything vital. Leave it to their wretched luck to abandon them in the last five minutes. 

“Reverting the landing sequence,” Ren said at the same time Hux cried out: “No!” 

It was too late. The already overheated engine core that held together only with half of the usual systems rerouted sputtered and went out entirely, plunging the cockpit into dark-gray haze of rain-filtered, weak daylight. Hux could feel the bottom of his stomach lurch as the shuttle lost antigravity and succumbed to freefall. 

“Kriff,” Ren muttered and wrenched the helm controls towards him. Hux lurched for them but was thrown off with a violent jerk of the shuttle, now a toy of air currents, careening towards the ground in an ever tightening spiral. 

“Can you switch the wing flaps manually?” Ren shouted. Hux, momentarily disoriented, found the proper circuit box on second try. Yanking it open and short-circuiting the wires, the thing sparked in his face but the fused circuits caused the flaps to switch into default position. 

“Flaps out.” 

The resulting jerk nearly knocked the breath out of his lungs but finally the shuttle straightened, using the long wings and flaps to glide towards the surface in a swooping dive. They were still approaching too fast but at last it wasn’t an uncontrolled fall. 

“I can’t see anything,” Ren growled, gripping the helm and trying to pull up the shuttle’s nose to make a better use of the air cushion under their keel. The shuttle rattled, the structure not meant to withstand such strain for long. 

“The clouds usually go as deep as two hundred meters above the surface,” Hux shouted over the creaking of the hull. Hopefully the shuttle wouldn’t fall apart on its own before they could smash it against the ground intentionally.... Or not? Hux tried to remember how far the original Academy airstrip was from the sea. 

The clouds tore before them and for a second, Hux was nearly blinded by the silvery reflection of dull daylight on the sea surface. Yes. 

“Keep this course,” he shouted when he noticed that Ren’s automatic reaction was to steer them away from the sea. “We have better chances to survive this with water landing.” 

“But - I can’t swim!” 

The absurdity of it would make Hux laugh if the glittering waves weren’t rising to meet them so damn quickly. He gripped the edges of his seat, bracing himself for the impact. 

“Well, then I hope you packed your rubber ring,” he managed to get out before everything around them exploded in a cacophony of tortured metal and hissing electronics.


	3. Barbecue in the "garden"

Hux must have blacked out for a moment because when he came to, the only movement of the shuttle he could feel was a gentle swaying, accompanied by the soft soothing noise of waves breaking against the hull.

He tried to stand, blinking against the rush of dizziness that made his guts clench uncomfortably. He never liked being seaborne - the constant rocking motion didn’t agree with his stomach. But this was definitely preferable to the alternative of having their bloodied bits scattered across the hard duracrete runway on the Academy premises. The command shuttle, with its wings outstretched, made for a surprisingly good glider…

... but a shit boat. Hux swore when he realised that the sound of splashing water wasn’t coming from the outside. Quick glance down the narrow corridor connecting the cockpit with the cargo bay revealed that the back half of the shuttle - including the locked weaponry racks - was already drowned and the gurgling water surface was rising steadily towards the front.

Still swearing, Hux slid across the slowly tilting floor to the emergency hatch, hoping that the crash didn’t jam the lock mechanism. Flipping off the safety a pulling the lever, Hux huffed out a breath of relief when the hatch door cracked open - and then he let out a fresh string of curses when the door fell out of its hinges, narrowly avoiding skinning his head on its way to the floor. Hux stuck his head out and was greeted by a spray of cold drizzle in his face - and the blessed sight of the shore some twenty meters away.

The survival kit was mercifully placed in a compartment right next to the emergency hatchway. The bag was inflatable and it puffed up automatically as soon as Hux threw it out and into the water. It would help a good deal in making it to the shore safely, Hux was a good swimmer but–

“Kriffing hells.”

Hux clambered back up to the pilot seat containing Ren’s slumped form, his fingers still taut around the helm. He must have tried until the last moment to pull up so that the shuttle would hit the water surface at best possible angle - and now there was a fresh trickle of blood from his temple dripping down the consoles. The smooth surface of the screen right under his half-opened mouth was fogged. Still alive, then.

  
The first splash of water bubbled playfully around Hux’s ankles. He looked down and then back - some twenty seconds more and he wouldn’t be getting out of this sinking trap alive. Ren was heavy - it took two Stormtroopers to carry him into the shuttle down on Starkiller…

...and he was damn huge inconvenience anyway. One more mouth to leech off the rations, a bottomless waste pit for precious bacta patches, constant annoyance at the best of times and now?

Hux had exponentially better chances at disappearing and blending in with the New Republic good citizens if he was alone. Hells, he would have had better chances at swimming to the shore unharmed if he was alone and quick - there was a reason why the Academy Cadets used pools for their aquatic exercises. It would have been handy having around Ren’s powers and neat little mind tricks but without the Force, Ren was nothing but a burden. Completely useless, like a water-soaked strip of paper.

 

*

 

Twenty minutes later Hux finally hauled Ren’s body above the tide line, called himself a fool for the hundredth time and kicking Ren in the ribs for good measure. It might have worked better in letting out his anger if he wasn't exhausted to the point of blacking out - but even under the pathetic excuse for a kick Ren curled on himself, groaning and coughing up muddy saltwater.

The survival kit still floated in the waves. Hux grabbed it before it could be washed away and staggered to his feet. His boots squelched and he sank to his ankles into the wet sand. If he wasn’t already soaking wet from the swim, the steady rain would have turned his uniform into a soggy mess in no time at all. He had to find a shelter - preferably a room with a roof and walls to keep out the wind-sprayed rain - and he hoped at least some of the Academy’s living quarters survived the Rebel bombardment and subsequent thirty years of neglect in solid enough shape to provide that.

Wiping the rain out of his eyes, Hux searched the line of jagged rocks that formed the base of the cliff higher up the beach. There used to be paths trodden by nerfs - there. Hux dragged the survival kit over the rocks and up the narrow path, the decrepit and half-demolished Academy building looming not so far behind the cliff. As for Ren, he could get there in his own time.

The small building of the gate guards appeared relatively unscathed. The Rebels had raided it, of course - but apart from confiscating any weaponry and frying up the house defence system they left the structure in good shape. Hux was confident that given a bit of time, he should be even able to kick up the generator. But for now the only thing that mattered was that the guards sleeping quarters weren’t inhabited with vermin and that the air inside, though filled with dust, was dry. Hux peeled off his dripping uniform, wrapped himself in the thermal blanket from the survival kit and collapsed on one of the mould-covered beds. He was asleep before his head hit the mattress.

Which was an extremely stupid thing to do, as he realised immediately after startling awake some hours - judging by the change in the grayness outside - later. The survival bag lied gutted at the feet of the bed, with half of the contents strewn across the room, and sure enough - several of the protein bars were missing. Four, if Hux was counting right. Trust Ren to be selfish and greedy.

A clattering sound from the front room drew his attention. Hux threw the half-dried uniform jacket over his shoulders, shivering with the cold. He should really have a look at the generator as soon as possible.

The sight that greeted him after he walked out of the front room was… unexpected. Somehow, Ren had managed to collect enough bits of driftwood and broken furniture to start a small fire under the overreaching roof in the guardhouse porch. His black outer robes were strewn around the porch on a makeshift line made of the coil of rope he’d found in the survival kit - already drying up nicely and also keeping the fire from being spotted from a distance, Hux noted with begrudging approval. But what was most surprising were the two roasted protein bars, still warm, sitting on their folded wrapping in an empty place next to Ren and being ignored with the same ostentatiousness with which Ren currently ignored him.

The bars were usually unpalatable but the fire added a sort of smokey crunchiness to them - or it was the fact Hux would have devoured a whole nerf calf at this point - but he ate it with relish. Ren’s eyes were fixed on the flames the whole time Hux munched and he seemed to be humming a little tune under his breath. It would have been ridiculously… Hux suspected the word was _nice_ … if they weren’t stranded on a hostile planet with no bloody ship.

“I believe your original plan was to collect as much of the resources hidden away during the evacuation as we could and then take off to a safer location,” Ren spoke at last. His voice sounded gruff as if he was speaking on a raw throat. Hux noticed that the scratch on his temple had already scabbed.

“Why do you think there are such resources?”

Ren rolled his eyes. “You wouldn’t be taking us here if it was just the falling-apart ruin it seems to be. It makes sense that the defenders would try to leave something behind - there could be hidden vaults. Probably booby-trapped.”

“Correct - on both,” Hux dropped the pretence. “There should be enough to get us to the nearest town. It has a spaceport - there will be more options than we have here.”

“How far?”

“Several hours on foot.”

Ren merely nodded. Hux decided not to remind him that there was no way he could walk several hours with a still healing wound in his side.

 _That’s what I get for my pity_ , Hux thought. _A big brooding weight to slow me down._

“General… thank you. For saving me. Twice.”

Hux considered it. Having a Knight of Ren in his debt was once one of his life-goals. Not it was just a nuisance he wished he could ignore.

“I was carrying out Snoke’s orders,” he said dismissively.

“Not the second time,” Ren pointed out.

Hux couldn’t find anything to say to that. He wrapped his jacket tighter around his shoulders and stepped back into the house. He could use a few more hours of sleep. Ren’s dark eyes followed him with something strangely resembling amusement. The handprint on his cheek had darkened into a purple bruise.

It wasn’t until Hux stumbled across the survival kit contents on the sleeping quarters floor and began to throw them angrily back into the bag when he realised that the small hand-blaster was missing.

Kriffing hell. Hux now had to hope that the Knight was taking his life-debt seriously.


	4. Music festival/Popular ball in Arkanis

Sometime during the night, Hux was awoken by the stifled noise of Ren getting ready for bed across the room to Hux’s. There was only one thermal blanket in the survival kit and Hux wasn’t about to share it. Ren’s battered robe, dried by the fire and now filling the room with the acrid smell of smoke, would have to be enough for the Knight. The sound of sterile wrapping tearing and a muffled pained hiss - Ren was tending the wound in his side by the light of the small torch that had also been a part of the kit. Hux had half the mind to tell him not to waste the batteries but in the end he kept his eyes shut, pretending to be fast asleep. It was nice to be able to get away with it - the old Ren would have called the bluff, but this diminished, weakened Ren didn’t have a clue. 

The morning dawned cloudy and chilly but thankfully free of rain. Hux had been too young to remember the nearly constant rains but now he was certain that even if he did, he wouldn’t miss it. 

By the noon, Hux had explored all the places he could remember. Some of them had been discovered by Rebels during the raid, some must have been scavenged later by the look of them but he was lucky to find a couple of vaults still intact. His loot wasn’t exactly what he was hoping for - there were enough spare parts to build several airspeeders but no repulsorlift - but he was very pleased with the other half of the pile. There was a surprising number of things one could do with just enough explosives. 

The invisible sun had long passed the noon mark - the change only noticeable by a steady drop of temperature - when Hux realised he’d finished a second circle around the tallest structure still standing and there wasn’t anything to find on the ground anymore. Well, he couldn’t postpone it forever. Grabbing a couple of grenades, Hux entered the building and made his careful way up the stairs to the Commandant’s personal quarters. 

The rooms were a mess - Hux had expected as much. What he didn’t expect was the black, still slightly hunched to one side, _annoying_ figure of Kylo Ren, snooping through the remnants of his former life.  

“You weren’t a Cadet yet when you left,” Ren observed aloud, not turning from where he was examining the farthest wall of the parlour. It still displayed a haphazard pattern of framed rank insignia - some of the frames still hanging up, most of them scattered on the floor below. The Commandant’s Cadets’ wall of fame. 

“Obviously. I was only four years old. Even basic training wouldn’t make much sense at that age,” Hux said, trying to keep the edge out of his voice. _He_ never forced _his_ soldiers into tasks they weren’t developmentally able to perform.  

“At four, a child was usually considered too old to enter Jedi training,” Ren said after a while. Hux blinked. What had that to do with anything? Ren was clearly no Jedi - did he perhaps use to be one? 

“Is that why you’ve run out of your quota so soon?” 

Hux couldn’t help himself. Watching Kylo Ren throw out his arm with fingers curled towards him only to let it fall uselessly back to his side was too precious. He should have taken a holo of that. 

“Still nothing?” Hux tutted with false sympathy as he moved into the room. There was a certain vault he remembered all too well. Not even the Commandant’s aide - a haggard man whose main task was to keep Brendol’s drinking on a level that wouldn’t besmirch his public reputation - knew about it back in the day. Rumours said that Corellian whiskey got even better with time. Hux was smirking when he retrieved two bottles of the golden liquid from their hiding place, put one of the grenades in their place, left another on the Commandant’s office desk and headed for the exit. 

“I wouldn’t dawdle if I were you,” he called over his shoulder to Ren who was still drifting aimlessly around the rooms. “I’ve already retrieved the only items of any value here. The place is now going to get some redecorating.” 

Ren followed Hux down the stars, and it might be Hux’s paranoia but he was giving him sideways looks - and Hux couldn’t decipher them. Curiosity? Definitely. Amusement? Wouldn’t put it past Ren. Sympathy? Hux must have hit his head harder than he realised yesterday. 

They stopped in the middle of the parade ground and Hux turned, watching the familiar set of windows and counting down in his head. Next to him, Ren kept needling. 

“Your father put a lot of pride in his job.” 

“That comes naturally when you have a job you can be proud of,” Hux quipped back. 

“Those framed insignia plates.” Ren infuriatingly wasn’t rising to the bait this time. “Successful cadets?” 

“Elite cadets,” Hux corrected him automatically. Twelve, eleven, ten… 

“He was so proud of them he kept them in place of honour in his quarters,” Ren carried on. 

Six, five, four… 

“Interesting that I haven’t found a single picture of his only son.” 

Hux gritted his teeth as a dull _bang_ echoed faintly from above and a cloud of dust poured out from the empty window frames. He had chosen the grenade type well - no fire, very little noise, pulverizes everything in close range but too weak to damage the statics of the entire tower.  

“Haven’t you?” he said cooly once the dust dispersed in the ever present wind. “What a pity. You won’t be able to find any now, I’m afraid.” 

Ren threw one look at the shattered windows and another at Hux - and now he definitely looked amused. 

“Felt good?” 

Hux recalled all the times back then when he was called into the parlour, made to stand at attention while Brendol berated him for this and that, watching the set of frames on the wall with longing and later at night, dreaming about _smashing it_ – 

“Very good.” 

The infuriating small smile kept playing around Ren’s lips as he started to walk back to the guard house. 

“Did you know that tomorrow, the Ascension week festival would be starting back in the Imperial days?” 

Oh. Hux remembered that, too. The cadets used to get two days off - an unusual indulgence - to meet with their families. His father would host a party for the officers. Little Armitage wasn’t allowed on the premises at all. 

“What are you proposing, Ren? Fireworks, perhaps, to attract even those locals that happened to miss our shuttle shooting from the sky?” 

Ren ignored the sarcasm. “I never saw the Ascension fireworks,” he said wistfully. “I was born too late.” 

It was getting darker - and colder. Hux stood aside and watched Ren busy himself with the fire. He put the generator at the top of his mental list for tomorrow. 

Bloody Ascension week. Hux had hated it then, just as he hated this entire place. Always excluded, always shunned, like a shameful secret that had to be kept out of sight– 

“I suppose we could do with a little celebration,” Hux found himself handing Ren one of the bottles before he it fully registered with him what in hells was he doing. Above the little flames tentatively licking at the wood, Ren’s eyes were gleaming.


	5. Wilderness Camping/Hiking

“No lights in the house,” Hux warned Ren, watching with satisfaction as the basement generator coughed and sputtered to life with a shower of little sparks. It didn’t look very stable but it would heat up the sleeping quarters, and maybe even the shower water tanks - if the pumps weren’t entirely consumed by rust by now. 

Fortunately for him, Ren chose to be a diplomat and not remind Hux that he literally blew up a room in the Academy tower not twelve hours earlier. Even now, he only nodded, although Hux’s warning was unnecessary at best - Ren had been behaving with appropriate caution ever since they came here. But today he was particularly mellow and agreeable. It made Hux almost nervous. He’d been needling Ren - fishing for a fight, really - the entire morning but the Knight remained stoic. 

Back in the house, Hux sat down to assemble a makeshift blaster from the parts he’d found yesterday. Asking Ren to relinquish the one he stole from the survival kit was futile - and with the asking, Hux would be admitting that the reality of a weapon in Ren’s possession disturbed him, and that would be foolish. 

Lifting his eyes from his work, Hux stole a quick glance at the current subject of his thoughts. Ren sat on his bed, back propped against the wall, head tilted back with his eyes closed, and appeared to be meditating. The hand-shaped bruise on his cheek seemed even brighter today. Wasn’t it supposed to be fading by now? 

Hux doubted that a single slap like the one he delivered in the shuttle was enough to make Ren the almost pleasant companion he’d been this morning. More likely he was still battling the consequences of last night’s drinking, Hux smirked to himself. Between them, they finished off one of the bottles before they tucked themselves in for the night. But whereas Hux’s stamina saw a lifetime of training, Ren was a pitiful lightweight. This morning, he’d silently refused his portion of the rations, and Hux laughed under his breath as he watched him moving around slowly and carefully as walking on eggshells. His skull had to be throbbing. 

Even now there was a slight pinch to Ren’s brow and his entire face was tense, the skin around his lips pale. Wasn’t meditation meant to relax people? 

Maybe it was different for Force users. Ren was probably still trying to reconnect with the Force or whatever he was supposed to be doing. Hux wondered if one could push himself too far - not physically, but mentally. 

Ren had claimed that pain wasn’t working in bringing the Force back. Hux didn’t know why would anyone choose suffering to gain some mystical powers but then he’d seen what those powers could do, so clearly the benefits outweighed the costs. Was there any other path to the Ren’s beloved Dark Side than pain? Anger - but Ren had been backing away from it lately. Denial - starvation? 

Hux frowned when he realised that the last option was slowly becoming not some nebulous way to the Force but a bitter reality for them both. The would be eating their last portions tomorrow, and although the bars were enough to keep them alive, Hux was already starting to feel the lack of proper nourishment. Reduced strength, nearly constant headache, jittery mood… simply put, Hux was hungry. 

Funny how one was always hungry on Arkanis. 

Hux slid the power pack into the proper place and double-checked that the overload sturm dowel was functioning and safe. The last thing he wanted was a thirty year old capsule of tibanna gas in his blaster exploding at his belt. 

“Going to hunt?” 

Hux startled before he realised that Ren didn’t need mind reading for his thought processes to follow the same path. 

“There used to be nerfs wandering around the Academy,” Hux told him. 

“Be careful.” 

Hux scoffed. “Shooting a stray nerf calf is hardly a dangerous hunt, Ren.” 

Ren’s eyes remained closed. “Where are nerfs, there are usually nerfherders,” he said. 

That was his comeback for the _no lights in the house_ comment, Hux realised. Well then.  

He briefly considered asking Ren to go with him. Together they would have better chance at chasing a calf away from the herd. But Ren would probably decline just to be contrary and frankly, Hux was going to enjoy the however short time he wouldn’t be seeing Ren whenever he looked up. 

 

*

 

Ren didn’t have to be worried about nerfherders. There were barely any nerfs in the area. It was raining again and there was not a dry thread on Hux as he hiked along the cliff top, eyes scanning alternatively the muddy ground before him and his surroundings, before he chanced upon what looked like a fresh set of hoof prints. 

Predictably, the track led Hux down the cliff wall and onto the rocky shore. Young nerfs craved salt and oftentimes, it would lead them to their doom. 

The wind was coming from inland today. Hux watched the calf - a fairly grown up one, at this time of year - wandering close to the tide line and licking at salt-covered pieces of driftwood. He would have to sneak around in a broad circle to get into a position for a good shot without the calf smelling him first - a bad shot would mean smell of blood and panicked bleating, both sure-fire ways to attract far more dangerous predators than Hux. 

Keeping one eye at the sea and another on the slowly trotting animal, Hux made his way through the slippery rocks and sand covered with lumps of horridly smelling seaweed. Water bubbled up around his ankles every time his heels dug into the wet sand. He was far closer to the water than any of the cadets ever dared to but the sea was calm and undisturbed. He was so close now to the unsuspecting calf that one clean shot would have felled it, so close that he could almost _taste_ the nerf steak on his tongue–  

The calf yowled in alarm just as Hux was lining his blaster for a shot. It sprang up with all four in the air and then nearly fell as it scrambled to run, wet sand flying everywhere. A splash of gritty water hit Hux in the face and he instinctively took a step back. His foot got caught in the sand and he lost his balance, free hand thrown out to grab a hold on the rock but fingers grasping just the slippery weed– 

–a mass of something heavy and sharp fell onto his shoulder, the impact nearly flattening him into the sand. His arm flared up in blinding pain and he could hear the clatter of his blaster on the rocks as it was knocked out of his hand. Twisting and rolling, Hux tried to reach for his blaster but the weight was now hooking around him, pulling and dragging, a monstrous claw with bits of rocks and shells embedded in its carapace. If Hux hadn’t slipped in the last moment, his skull would have been smashed to a pulp… 

A high-pitched, screeching sound was coming out of the creature’s maw as it dug its segmented legs into the sand, using the leverage to drag Hux into the waves. Hux trashed and fought, trying to dodge the stabs of another pointed claw coming down on him like an oversized skewer and kicking the joints of the claw holding him - but the creature’s shell was thick and not even a blaster would make a hole in it, even if Hux could fucking reach it– 

Someone was yelling and there was the unmistakable buzzing _crack_ of a blaster shot. The claw wrapped around Hux’s midsection tightened, tearing through his uniform, and he howled - another shot and the pressure was gone, the appendage dead now but its joints locked into place, still dragging Hux away with the retreating creature. Hux lifted his head and just about saw Ren picking up something - drawing his arm back - and then throwing something over Hux’s head, right into the monster’s wide open maw.  

For a second the creature froze in surprise and Hux could hear the gurgling sound of its guts as it swallowed. And then the world exploded in a flurry of shattered carapace and flying scraps of soft tissue. 

When Hux finally sat up - covered head to toe in wet sand, slimy seaweed and the creature’s gore - Ren was kneeling half-slumped against one of the rocks, breathing as if he’d run the Kessel run on foot, and the overload sturm dowel from Hux’s makeshift blaster still clutched in his hand. 

“Neat,” Hux said when he caught his breath. He couldn’t _really_ reproach Ren for using Hux’s blaster’s power pack as a grenade when it just saved him from being drowned and devoured. Quite possibly not in that order.  

“The calf got away,” Ren mumbled. 

“Doesn’t matter,” Hux looked around him at the rocks literally strewn with mince-meat and wrinkled his nose. “These bastards are considered a delicacy, would you believe it?” 

“It certainly considered _you_ a delicacy,” Ren giggled.  

Hux did a double take. In all of the six years he’d known Ren, he hadn’t seen him laugh once. And now Ren had _giggled_.  

Hux staggered to his feet, hissing when the salt-soaked uniform rubbed at the multiple lacerations littering his body, and limped towards the Knight who still seemed to have difficulty drawing breath. Sure enough, when he got to him, he could see the high spots of red on his cheeks and when he lifted Ren’s chin, he was met with a glassy stare of feverish eyes. 

“Stars, Ren,” the man’s forehead was covered in little droplets and Hux was sure it wasn’t all rain. “You’re burning up.” 

Experimentally, he’s put his hand on Ren’s side. The man immediately recoiled, whimpering with pain. Hux’s glove came away stained yellowish brown.

Kriff. Hux felt a pang of guilt for letting Ren treat his wounds on his own. He should have known the Knight would make a piss poor job of it. 

 

 

 


	6. When the A/C breaks down

It was probably too much to expect that the guards house generator would be still working when they finally got back. 

Just their rotten luck, Hux thought. He hadn’t planned for staying here for so long to need any of this - warmth, hot water, fucking giant lobster stew. He hadn’t planned on having to drag Ren back from the brink of death over and over again. 

He should have let him drown. Hells, he should have jettison him out of the shuttle when he had the chance. 

Ren was delirious by the time they got back, his fever running high and the half-formed scar in his side puffy red and slowly oozing pus. Hux had disinfected it as well as he could, anxiously watching the dwindling state of their medical supplies. He’d had barely enough disinfectant spray to treat his own scratches from the encounter with the clawed sea creature.  His gaze fell on the remaining bottle of Correlian whiskey… 

At least they still had enough nullicaine. Hux doubted the room would survive the cleaning of Ren’s wound with alcohol without putting him out of it first, Force or no Force. 

Hux wasn’t a kriffing medic. He was a decent engineer, a good strategist, a dedicated commander– 

–except that he wasn’t now, was he? He’d discarded the command, his status, his future with a few taps on the navigational computer touchscreen. 

His plan didn’t include anyone else, and least of all a weakened, mentally unstable and unpredictable man. Hux had planned to land in the Arkanis Academy, collect the loot of supplies he knew would be there, leave Ren a beacon to contact whichever side of the war he chose to belong to, and make himself sparse. 

And he still could. He could take Ren’s overcoat to cover his uniform that despite being nearly in shreds still screamed First Order to anyone with functioning eyes. He could take the blaster when Ren slept, walk to the spaceport, steal a ship - there was no way Ren could follow him. There was nothing stopping him. 

Yet there he was - spoonfeeding giant lobster stew through Ren’s chattering teeth. 

Maybe because his shoulder still throbbed when he moved his arm and he still could feel the claw digging into his flesh every time he drew a deeper breath. Maybe because despite having caused their shuttle crashing, Ren actually landed them without smashing them to pieces. Maybe because without his powers to rely on, Ren turned out to be a surprisingly competent and resourceful companion. 

Not that Hux would be forgiving him the loss of Starkiller any time soon. But to be fair, Ren didn’t have anything to do with the shield going down at the most inopportune moment. He had been selfishly fixated on his own agenda with the scavenger and because of that, he’d brought the Resistance fire upon them - but if Starkiller base indeed was as perfect as Hux saw her, she would have held up. 

At least now they had enough food to last them several days. After that, Ren would be hopefully strong - and lucid - enough to take control of his own fate. 

Another cold night on Arkanis. 

Hux stared into the ceiling, wrapped in the thermal blanket to his ears - for warmth, and also to muffle the faint groans and bed frame creaks coming from the other side of the room where Ren tossed and turned, still wracked by fever. 

“...s’ cold...” 

“It’s the fever chills. I gave you some pills, it will pass.” 

How was Hux supposed to sleep when Ren’s teeth chattered so loudly? 

“... t-the generator?” 

Hux sighed. 

“The secondary circuit leaks coolant,” he said. “It powered itself off while we were out and I wouldn’t recommend switching it back on. Get some sleep, Ren.” 

Silence, though not quiet. Ren probably wasn’t aware of the sounds he was making - surely in his right mind, he’d be too proud to admit a weakness. 

Hux closed his eyes and willed the sleep to come. 

Ten minutes later, he stood up and stomped over to Ren’s bed. 

“Move over.” 

Ren’s tunic and leggings were still hanging up on the porch to dry, as was Hux’s uniform jacket and shirt. All the better for the skin contact, Hux guessed. Ren peeked up on him from under the robe he’d been trying to wrap more tightly around himself. 

“I’m not giving over the blanket,” Hux clarified. “So you better make some room for me while I still have the mind to share it.” 

Ren’s fever was still rampant, the skin of his bare arms almost scalding to the touch. Hux snorted to himself. Really, why was he half-freezing on his own bed when he could sleep next to this living furnace the whole time? He wrapped his arms around Ren’s body, ignoring the tensing of his muscles, and stuck his feet between Ren’s calves. 

“Kriff, you’re a- an icicle or–” 

“Ren, I’m tired. Go to sleep before I’ll have to strangle you.” 

Gradually, Ren relaxed into his hold. Hux noted with some satisfaction that the shivers had passed, too. Blessed warmth spread under the blanket, the sound of ceaseless rain pattering on the roof of their shelter almost hypnotic. 

“Good night, General.” 

It was said so soft - like a thank you. Except that Hux would have dismissed thanks, of course. His earlier thoughts came back to him, the ones about his future. 

“You realize I’m not a General any more. Not after this.” 

“So what should I call you?” 

“Hux will do.” There wasn’t any reason to disclose more. At least not while they were still on Arkanis, where names carried unwanted weight. 

Ren hummed. “I would’ve thought you’d prefer being called by rank. Or title. You call me by my title all the time, even though I could hardly defend it now.” 

He sounded sleepy. Hux, on the other hand, felt rather annoyingly awake. Yes, he knew Ren was the name of the order more than a family name, but using the first part of Kylo Ren’s name felt too much like being on a first name basis - which they absolutely weren’t. 

“I am not calling you Kylo,” he informed the Knight. 

“As you wish, General.” 

Well, if Ren was being contrary, he was surely getting better.  


	7. I don't have any swimsuit!

Hux’s internal clock must have got lagged with the much missed warmth because when he opened his eyes, the meagre gray light filtered through the rain-splattered bedroom window was definitely the Arkanis version of daylight.

Two other things immediately became just as apparent:

Firstly - Ren’s fever broke during the night. The burning heat of him was now diminished to a pleasant warmth that had Hux’s body responding on its own accord. How long was it since he last had a warm body to wake up next to? Or warm body in his bed, Hux’s memory conceded - allowing anyone to stay the night was beneath Hux’s standards long before he was appointed command of the Finalizer. How long was it since he wasn’t too exhausted, too stressed, or simply too busy to even wake up in this condition? In his half-asleep state, Hux wriggled his hips to push them closer to Ren’s backside, seeking friction on instinct. But then he’d abruptly stopped himself, because–

–secondly, Ren’s fever broke during the night, and as a result, the man was absolutely bathing in sweat. Solid sheen of it clung to him everywhere, little pools of it collected in every crease of the thermal blanket crumpled beneath his body, and Hux’s own undershirt was soaked through, arms and legs sticky and glued to Ren’s where their bare skin touched. Hux’s face scrunched in dismay. He’d known that squatting in a military facility that’d been burned down thirty years ago, _while_ also being on the run from both the First Order and the Resistance, wasn’t going to be a walk through a rose garden but this? This was rank, disgusting, and intolerable.

Ren, curse him, just _hhmpf_ ed something and went on sleeping as Hux peeled himself off him. Dismissing his semi-insistent morning erection as a natural reaction that had nothing to do with the man whom he thoroughly despised, Hux went to inspect some spare parts he’d found earlier. There wasn’t enough of them to assemble a handgun again but he might have an idea…

 

*

 

Ren stared at the large basin of hot water set next to an old chair so long that Hux started getting afraid he’d some irrational reserves about bathing. The narrow frosted windows under the ceiling were still fogged from Hux’s own earlier bath and the steam was making the otherwise frigid temperature of the old guard house showers feel almost bearable.

“Kelsh wire and batteries,” Ren said at last, nodding to the submerged coil of metal with boiling water bubbling merrily around it. “Neat.”

“Clothes off and on the chair, if you would.” Hux didn’t need his compliments. He needed him to stop smelling.

“Your wound mustn’t get soaked so you only get a sponge bath,” he explained when Ren didn’t seem forthcoming.

“I can tend to myself,” the Knight said at last.

“I’m afraid that has been disproven yesterday,” Hux tutted. “I’m not taking any risks until you’re sufficiently healed. Besides, you’ll need me to wash your hair. Unless you actually like to carry half of the beach's worth of sand in those knots and tangles of yours–”

“Fine,” Ren cut him off, dropping his filthy robe unceremoniously off his shoulders into Hux’s unprepared hands and lowering himself gingerly onto the chair, head tipped back in expectation.

It would have been better if they had a proper shampoo and not just a bar of antiseptic soap, Hux mused as he poured water over Ren’s hair and worked his fingers through the strands, washing away the sweat, sand, grime and dried blood.  Even in their sorry state, Ren’s locks tended to curl a little and reach far longer beneath his collar line than regulation allowed. But what about Ren was ever according to regulation?

“So, how come you can’t swim?” Aquatic exercises were par for the course on First Order academies. Everyone knew how to swim despite the fact that many people never saw a natural body of water in their life.

Ren had his eyes closed. With his hair pulled back, his face appeared even gaunter, its uneven features more unsettling. Hux doubted anyone could call this man attractive even though objectively speaking, no part of his face was defective or wrong - they just didn’t seem to work well together.

Ren muttered something. Hux squeezed the washcloth directly above his face and snorted when Ren gasped and spluttered.

“What was that?”

“I said, who needs swimming on a spaceship? I don’t even have a swimsuit.”

“I think that our experience proved that even spaceship can end up in water,” Hux didn’t back down. Ren trying to deflect a question always meant the answer was interesting enough to be pursued.

A pool of water collected in the hollow between Ren’s collarbones. Hux swiped the cloth along the arch of them, wide and prominent. Ren had enviable physique - shame he didn’t wear a uniform. His right shoulder was almost healed by now, a silvery line marking the parts where bacta patches turned insufficient.

“I never needed to learn,” Ren said after a while. “I’ve always… used the Force to keep me afloat.”

Hux snorted out a stifled laugh at that. _Of course_ Ren would. He moved in front of Ren, crouching down and carefully dabbing at the skin surrounding the wound in Ren’s side. Here, too, the bacta had been doing its best, but the wound was much deeper than a simple lightsaber cut - it almost looked like a blaster shot but Hux would like to see the caliber of the gun that’d fired the shot.

“Well, that wasn’t very wise, was it now.” Hux didn’t even know why he was keeping the conversation going. Looking at Ren and actually _seeing_ so much of his physicality - the human, vulnerable, _destroyable_ side of him - was suddenly too distracting.

“Why? If I could do it - why _not_ do it?”

“Honestly, this explains so much about you.”

“It wasn’t supposed to go away,” Ren said quietly. “It was only ever supposed to get _more_. When I trained - meditated - learned - the number of things I could do grew. If I trained enough - _focused_ _enough_ \- I would have become the greatest–”

“I know,” Hux said simply, putting a placating hand on Ren’s arm. Ren was tensing again - Hux missed the pliant, relaxed version of him.

The muscle under his palm twitched, as if Ren wasn’t used to be touched - not for the practical purposes of wound tending or washing but for the sole sake of comfort. His upper arms were dotted with a similar array of moles like his face and neck but his forearms were covered by hair - dark and fairly long, thinning towards his knuckles where he his gloves probably rubbed too often. Hux wondered why he never noticed this particular difference between them - where Hux’s body was milky smooth nearly all over, Ren had an abundance of body hair. Tufts of it started in the middle of his chest and thickened towards the vee of his hipbones, dark and so soft when washed - Hux ran his fingers through the cover of Ren’s abdomen, curling them into a fist and staring, fascinated, as the hair caught between his fingers pulled taut–

Startling back to himself, Hux snapped his eyes up to find Ren’s eyes fixed on him, some of that inexplicable gleam back.

“Why, General, like what you see?”

Hux grabbed the forgotten washcloth and dropped it into Ren’s lap with a wet _flop_.

“Actually, I was wondering, Ren. Are you part Wookie?”

Hux laughed on his way out of the showers so loud that he didn’t notice until he was out that Ren didn’t laugh at all.

 

 


	8. Fireworks/National day

The first charge went off three hours before dawn, in the outer perimeter. Hux mentally congratulated himself for taking extra care the day he’d been scouting out the Academy premises, setting traps and snares in two concentric circles around the ruins. He figured there were two kinds of possible intruders: ones that knew who they were after - those would not desist their advance, only proceed with either more caution or with heavier equipment - or ones who weren’t after them at all: just a local police, investigating the report of a shuttle crash. Those would think they’d just accidentally triggered some unexploded ordnance left behind from thirty years ago and would get as far as to the second perimeter before they realised something was wrong. 

In either case, Hux’s and Ren’s time of respite was over. 

Another explosion lit up the opposite side of the areal not two minutes after the first - someone got through the first perimeter but still triggered the second one. A coordinated sneak-upon attack: no curious locals, then. The orange blaze of flames coming through the windows saw Hux giving the finishing touches to his gear. Ren was already shouldering the bag with food and medical supplies. 

“A strike team,” Ren said. 

Hux paused, frowning. Ren couldn’t possibly have caught sight of any of the intruders yet. The Academy was a maze of ruined buildings and airstrike craters, and the perimeter was set wide to give them chance to disappear before anyone could get to them. 

  
“I… couldn’t sleep. And I haven’t heard a thing before the first charge went off. They must have arrived using terrain transport that doesn’t make much noise - speeder bikes, most probably - a small team, then, special forces. A troop carrier would be heard from a distance.” 

Hux nodded. Speeder bikes. Now, that was an idea. 

“They’ll have scanners,” Ren said when Hux motioned him towards the door. They had to get moving while the darkness and confusion was still on their side. 

“They'll think they don't need them,” Hux smirked and lifted the first item of his arsenal: a remote detonator. 

A push of a button and the empty window frames in the first floor of the main lecture hall started spouting blaster fire all over the open drill yard. 

“We have about a minute before they start to think it’s just a hail of pot shots,” Hux said, nudging Ren forward. “Maybe another one before they get in and find out it’s in fact just a series of blasting caps going off on the window sill.” 

Together, they sneaked out of the guard house, keeping their heads low and using the natural cover of vegetation that’d sprouted in the cracks of the once paved walkways. To their right, they could see a group of silhouettes - their outline sharp against the blaster fire: crouched, advancing forward in an organized formation, taking cover against the perceived attack. Six men, all coming from one direction. That meant there had to be at least six more, somewhere, if they split their party evenly. 

“Resistance soldiers,” Ren whispered quietly. Yes, Hux could see that too: rounded helmets with broad yellow visors, not the conical white or black helmets of Stormtroopers or Death troopers. 

“You seem relieved,” Hux whispered back. “I’d feel offended. Only twelve men to capture a man of your reputation?” 

Ren had looked at him oddly - as if he couldn’t decide if the compliment was genuine or mocking. 

“Organa… she’s Force sensitive. Considering my condition - it’s possible she believes I am dead.” 

The way he said it - there was such a void of any emotion that Hux suspected there must be a good deal of it running just beneath the surface. Ren kept on talking, his voice low and seemingly just for himself: 

“But the First Order could have brought a Knight of Ren with them. For all your cunning...” 

Oh. So Ren was afraid of his former comrades. Maybe they were just as eager to claim the title of Master as Hux’s opponents, who’d probably already snagged the command of Finalizer…      

Hux's attention was abruptly brought back to present when another six men emerged in the bushes in front of them; spread right across their escape route. Hux had been right, they weren’t paying attention to their lifeform scanners. But they were in the way nonetheless. 

“Over here,” Hux tugged at Ren’s sleeve and then rolled them both into an old catch gutter. It was full of dead, wet and rotting leaves and Ren was opening his mouth, predictably to ask how were they supposed to move silently in that, when Hux pushed another button on his remote. 

And nothing happened. Or so Ren must have thought, when he covered his head and then snorted quietly when no explosion blew up anywhere. 

“Hey, Cap,” the closest of the Resistance soldiers suddenly broke formation, stopping and frowning at the scanner screen blinking insistently on his forearm. Hux could feel Ren tensing, hand going under his robes, preparing to– he grabbed his hand and squeezed, _stay low_. 

“I’m picking up an active shield generator. Over there, that small building.” 

“Clever rat,” the leader chuckled and then thumbed his commlink. “Lads, leave that cannonade over there - I’ll bet you it’s just blanks. Our target is in the guard house.” 

Singular. So Ren was right - the Resistance thought it was just Hux who’d landed here, Hux who’d abandoned the battle over Starkiller to hide here like a rat– 

A squeeze of Ren’s hand and Hux realised he’d been gritting his teeth, blood pounding in his temples. _Stay calm._  

They watched the men from the second party run to the left, spreading in a semi-circle around their former refuge, the rest of the siege soon completed by the first party. 

“I thought you said the generator was out of use,” Ren hissed in his ear. 

“I said I wouldn’t recommend anyone to turn it on,” Hux corrected him. “Especially not when it's loaded, for example by a shield emitter.” 

Behind them, the circle around the house narrowed, and first two men made it towards the door. 

“Come on,” Hux muttered - and as Ren watched, the whole guard house seemed to puff up a little - a sharp crack broke the quiet - and then the entire structure turned into a flaming hellpit, the fireball spreading out before anyone from the strike team could even react. 

“I believe you said something about speeder bikes,” Hux said when the bits of duracrete stopped raining all around them. With a start, he noticed his hand was still in Ren’s. Curiously, Ren did not make a single comment when Hux let go. 

“Might be guarded,” he pointed out instead. Practical and focused - Hux felt a little off when he realised he’d been _waiting_ for Ren to react, angrily, awkwardly, anyhow. 

“Two men at most,” Ren continued. “For a man of your reputation...” 

Hux chose to believe Ren was genuinely complimenting him. 

“It’s an insult,” he agreed. They still kept low, away from the direct line between the guard house conflagration and the most probable location of the speeders. As a backdrop to the inferno, random explosions still continued to blast through the night air from various places throughout the Academy, the chain reaction set off as the fire spread. 

“And here I thought your past was settled with blowing up your father’s quarters,” Ren observed as another structure succumbed to the fire in a series of groaning cracks and a rain of sparks. 

“Small dreams will get you nowhere,” Hux laughed. “Besides, I thought you wanted to see the Ascension fireworks?”

 

 


	9. Road trip through the Outer Rim territories

The guard of the speeders was too busy trying to com their leader to find out what all those explosions were about to put up any real fight. Two blaster shots and ten minutes later and Hux was back to swearing.

“Does the Resistance recruit kriffing midgets or what?”

Ren kept his clothes - black, ragged and dirty was a common fashion sense in half the Galaxy after all - but Hux’s uniform was too badly off and too recognisable for him to pass, so he had to change. The yellow-brown helmet of the Resistance was fine but the overall was clearly made to fit someone at least a foot shorter than Hux.

Ren looked up from where he was divesting the speeders they would not be taking of anything they could sell. The arms and legs of the overall were too short for Hux’s limbs and the gear vest waist strap rode practically under his ribcage. Ren’s lips curled and he got back to work. Hux huffed. It wasn’t as if he needed the Knight’s approval of his looks, did he.

“What about their ship?” he asked instead.

“They needed at least a corvette to bring in the commando and the transport from the spaceport to here,” Ren said. “More hands aboard than we can tackle.”

“It’s a big spaceport,” Hux shrugged. “As the old Arkanis saying goes, there’s more than one fish in the sea.”

“You mean lobster.”

“Fuck off,” Hux laughed and tossed him the other helmet.

The speeder bikes were old and obsolete probably long before Hux was even born. Ren didn’t seem to mind, his grip on the handlebars relaxed and natural as if he grew up with the type. Considering what Hux knew of his background, it was very likely he did. Hux hopped behind Ren on the long seat, shuffled forward until he was flush with the broad back before him, and wrapped his arms around Ren’s middle.

Ren grunted and shifted away from the pressure.

“I don’t fancy falling off this thing when it kicks,” Hux protested.

“Could you at least not dig into my side? I swear you’ve got the knobbiest wrists I’ve ever seen.”

“Those wrists can still pack a punch, want a taste?”

After he’d wasted so much time tending it, Hux knew it would be silly to aggravate the wound in Ren’s side all over again. But shifting his hands lower would mean practically sticking them into his groin and that really wasn’t what their temporary armistice was about. In the end he settled for gripping the buckle of Ren's belt with his right hand and hooking his left arm awkwardly over Ren’s shoulder.

The really awkward thing though was waking up some twenty minutes later because the speeder bike was slowing down - they were entering the populated area and Ren was probably trying not to stick out of the lazy morning traffic. Hux cursed internally. Did he really fall asleep? Just so? Of all the dangerous things he’d ever done–

“I wouldn't have let you fall off, General.” The helmet modulated voice didn’t sound as deep as Ren’s old vocoder but it still startled Hux. Ren was driving one-handed, his other hand wrapped loosely around Hux’s wrist, Ren’s ridiculously huge fingers circling the entirety of it. Securing him. The too short sleeve of the stolen overall combined with the odd angle of his arm had exposed the bare skin of Hux’s forearm but despite the chilly morning drizzle Ren’s hand felt warm. Hux’s fingers tingled. He pulled his hand out of Ren’s grasp and shook it, trying to get rid of the obnoxious pins and needles dancing under his skin.

“We should get off the streets,” Ren nodded towards one patrol post they passed, the men dozing off, heads lolling. The fast approaching dawn would bring the arrival of the day shift and fresh sets of eyes to the patroled spots.

“We should get off the planet,” Hux grumbled. So far the slowly waking city seemed unaware of the massacre at the Academy grounds but that would soon change.

Ren pulled out a map of the area on the bike’s navigational unit, frowned and abruptly swerved off the main highway, diving into the maze of urban sprawl at the city perifery.

“What are you doing?” Hux had to grab the folds of Ren’s tunic at the sudden change of direction before he managed to right himself back up.

“There was a reason the commando arrived at night, other than to catch us… you,” Ren amended, “asleep. They didn’t want to attract unnecessary attention to themselves.”

There were several major intersections on the road to the space port, most of them manned to keep the traffic smooth. Hux knew that but he also knew that their window of opportunity was a very narrow one.

“So you’re saying these yellow buckets aren’t exactly a disguise?”

“Definitely better than an FO cap,” and Hux could hear the smirk in Ren’s voice even through the modulator. “But the Resistance wasn’t exactly popular in New Republic space. They have a reputation of warmongers and ever since the news of Organa’s parentage was made public, nobody was too keen to support them openly.”

“That might change now,” Hux observed quietly. It would be foolish not to squeeze the victory at Starkiller, the destroyer of worlds, for every drop of popularity, and Organa wasn’t a fool.

They cut a few corners through the narrow streets of the old city, early workers or late pubcrawlers barely bothering to lift their eyes from the pavement. At last, the beehive structure of hangar bays and terminals rose before their eyes. Ren’s cautious approach had one unexpected advantage: this part of the port hosted mainly repair sheds and bays with less savoury reputation - higher handling charges, less paperwork to file, cash on the barrelhead and no questions asked.

Ren stopped them in front of one such bay. The door control dignalled occupied while all the rest in this section were empty. Hux activated the door terminal and made a face when he saw the information.

“G9 Rigger freighter,” he muttered.

“Then we better be quick,” Ren said. “The odds are of ten to one that it belongs to spicers and they would be getting back at dawn.”

“You’re saying you know how to pilot that piece of junk?”

“All Correlian freighters are the same,” Ren shrugged and pried off the terminal casing.

One day, Hux was going to ask Ren where in hells did he get such thorough knowledge about smugglers’ ships, tricks and habits - but for now, he just grabbed their bag of supplies and followed Ren into the hangar bay.

 


	10. The First Order spring-summer collection

Ren’s initial evaluation of the owners of the freighter turned out to be spot on. Hux took a quick inspection of the ship and as soon as he entered the sleeping quarters, his mood took a considerable downward plunge.

The starboard cabin was obviously shared by the pair of the original crew, and it was just as obvious that the spicer and their cutter shared more than a business enterprise. The original bunkbeds had been dismantled and remade into one large bed. It was half-buried under a mess of dirty clothes, empty ration-wrappings and haphazardly stacked holo chips, and absolutely reeked of sex.

Some of the clothes looked like a better fit than the too-small Resistance overall but the bedding was a prime candidate for the airlock.

The worst was that as filthy as it was, it was the only bed aboard. Because the port side cabin was…

“Who raises a child on a spice freighter?” Hux asked, the loud question falling on empty air. Ren had disappeared back into the cockpit as soon as he took one look at the redecorated cabin: the cot, the Tooka plushie, the old AT-AT toy.

It was lucky the pair of spice smugglers took their child with them for whatever business they had on Arkanis. Hux had just enough on his plate in dealing with the man-child he’d been saddled with.

“You do realize it’s a highly irresponsible way to raise a child,” Hux pointed out, fiddling with the navigator seat settings and trying to break the bubble of heavy silence surrounding the Knight. Ren never was one for idle talk but now he managed to speak volumes with _not_ talking. His affected indifference was, as usual, far more unsettling than any outright hostility would have been. It raised Hux’s hackles like nothing else.

“Constantly on the run from the authorities, dangerous smuggling routes, spice gang rivalry–” Hux began to tick off on his fingers.

“But it’s with its family.” It was spoken quietly, Ren’s eyes fixed on the navigational maps.

“Family of outlaws,” Hux shrugged. “It’d most likely grow into another criminal. Sometimes having parents isn’t the best that can happen to a child.”

“As opposed to being taken from them at a young age, being told not to fear, not to miss, not to _feel_ , being raised to fit a mould - oh, General, I’ve seen the ends of that.”

“FN-2187 was a one-time aberration,” Hux hissed. “Out of thousands that performed perfectly–”

Ren’s eyes finally flicked over to Hux, wide, surprised. “I wasn’t talking about First Order.”

Hux blinked. “The Jedi?”

Ren was again back to studying the sector maps and keying in a hyperspace jump calculation. They’d agreed before to stop at a trade post, to get some supplies and further confuse their track.

“The Jedi had been doing that for millennia,” he said eventually. “It was thought to be the only way.”

When Hux was born, the Jedi were already a myth. A history lesson back in the days of the Empire about servants of the Republic who’d in the end turned against it. Whom did they think they served then? Some higher principles? In Hux’s experience, there wasn’t any such thing. Someone’s good always came at the cost of someone else's suffering.

“Well,” Hux cleared his throat when the silence again began to stretch too uncomfortably, “no wonder they’re extinct.”

Ren snorted. “Practically, yes.”

Which wasn’t the same as _totally_ , Hux knew. But Skywalker called himself the Last.

“Were you...” Hux ventured onto the thin ice. With Ren this talkative, it seemed worth trying to make the most of it.

“No.”

“Did you want to be?”

Ren finished the calculations and sat back, watching the stars turn into blue-white lines. The hyperspace engine roared behind them - it was just one ring, a midget compared to Finalizer’s mighty array, but on the other hand Hux was never this close to it when it engaged, close enough to hear the sound through his bones.

“Somebody I used to know did,” Ren said when the lightspeed was breached and the pitch of the noise lowered back to acceptable level.

“But then, he wanted to be a smuggler first.”

 

*

 

Hux’s new outfit fit him better than the last but that was its only redeeming quality. That, and the numerous hidden pockets. Concealing a small hand blaster in one of those took him instantly half-way towards feeling like his old self again. The other half he hoped to achieve in front of a mirror.

“Don’t,” Ren stopped his hand just as Hux was about to put the razor to his skin.

“I used to wear a mask,” he continued, in that confusing speech pattern of his. “You were a poster face, General.”

Hux scratched at his chin and scowled at his reflection. “This is terrible.”

“It’s not First Order fashion,” Ren pointed out. “That counts.”

Hux scowled some more. To add insult to the injury, Ren’s scruff had grown soft, thick and nicely localized - a soft moustache and the promise of a goatee. Hux suspected Ren must have been trimming the shape when Hux wasn’t looking. Hux’s own beard was a mess of bristly ginger spikes that was making him look like a nerfherder.

Maybe Ren had a point.

Said man was currently digging around the living quarters, accidentally activating a mouse droid that immediately skittered off to clean the floor, and finally emerging with an extra blanket.

Hux eyed the bed. It was wide enough that they could sleep without suffering each other’s knees and elbows, and wrapped each in his own blanket they would not have to touch each other at all.

It was probably for the best. Hux had never slept so soundly as he did in those two nights he’d shared a blanket with Ren - he’d kriffing _fallen asleep_ on a speeder bike just because Ren was close - apparently his body decided to trust the man when Hux’s mind was strongly against it. He couldn’t afford oversleeping every morning, and he couldn’t afford trusting someone who’d leave him - probably as soon as they arrived to the trade post.

The bed frame creaked and the mattress had a permanent dip in the middle. Hux resolutely kept to his half.

“Good night, General.”

“I told you not to call me that.”

“You know my terms, General.”

Maybe losing Ren at the trade post wasn’t such a bad idea.


	11. Luxury Cruise

Kemal Station was damp and stifling hot. The permanent fog permeating the place probably aided in a lot of the illegitimate business that was going on there. 

The trading post was owned by a Rodian who apparently spent three quarters of his life napping on the couch in the back office. The front was operated by a rusted protocol droid whose main function was to barter repair services for goods and complain about what the weather was doing to its joints.

“I swear this was the mouthiest protocol droid I ever met,” Hux grumbled when they emerged out of there. “Aren’t they supposed to be polite and subservient?”

Ren pocketed the freshly charged credit chip, the corners of his mouth curled up in that quietly amused expression of his. 

“This one was probably reprogrammed to better serve its master,” he said. “Did you notice he swindled you out of a hundred credits?”

“He did not.”

“Hm, maybe a hundred and twenty would be more accurate.”

“And you let him?!”

“In this business, traders take care to remember the smart ones. They can swindle  _ them _ . The dumb ones can be forgotten because they will come back anyway.”

“You just got your kick out of it, admit it.”

“That too, yes.”

“I hate you.”

“Tell me something I don’t know.”

“I doubt you know the extent of your–”

“Oh, those sweet, sweet days of honeymoon. Nothing like it, eh?”

Hux turned as if stung, glowering at the little Ssori perched in his suit. The alien was leaning against the cantina door frame, as casually as the rigid mechanical joints of his suit would allow, and looked as if he was just thrown out after he’d run out of his credits.

“Ooh don’t give me that, sweetie, I’m not after your man,” the Ssori laughed, a series of high-pitched, hiccuping sounds. “Even if you weren’t wearing your spousal belts, I know a pair of lovebirds when I see one.”

The Ssori tapped the side of his bulbous eye, a substitute gesture for his total lack of nostrils. Hux looked at his ‘borrowed’ belt with a growing sense of alarm. He’d noticed that they were rather… matching…. but he’d thought it was just a matter of two for the price of one.

“Let me guess - your transport broke down,” the drunkard carried on with his wild assumptions. “What a shame. Having a spat in this middle of nowhere isn’t what you imagined of your honeymoon. But don’t worry. Captain Triblen’s got just what you need!”

Hux tried to walk past with a resolute ‘not interested’ expression. His attempt was undermined by the kriffing nightmare of his companion - Ren threw his arm over Hux’s shoulder and stuck his monstrous nose next to Hux’s ear.

“Let him tattle,” he whispered, “darling,” he added aloud. He was biting his bottom lip in an obvious attempt not to laugh. Hux jammed his elbow between Ren’s ribs.

“Maybe you have,” he decided to play along, addressing the Captain. “Is your ship headed for Eriadu?”

Hux in fact hadn’t decided yet where he wanted to disappear and start over. Eriadu was just one of the places he really didn’t want to go.

“Eriadu!” the Ssori threw his arms so wide that he nearly toppled. Hux wondered if that mechanical suit could get drunk too. “The fabulous  _ Naboo Celebration _ goes anywhere your heart desires, and if you want to Eriadu, Eriadu it is!”

“A pleasure cruiser,” Ren whispered. Hux shuddered internally.

“We’ll think about it,” he pulled his ‘husband’ along. Ren was still snickering.  

“Hangar seventeen!” Captain Triblen squeaked after them. “We’re taking off tomorrow morning, if you want to travel with us, don’t be late! We provide soundproofed cabins too!”

Hux couldn’t get out of there fast enough.

“Just to be clear, I am not posing as a newlywed on a pleasure cruiser, if that’s what you’re thinking about,” he hissed when they finally were out of earshot. “Even the Resistance isn’t that dumb.”

“Wouldn’t think about it, husband dear.”

“If I find out you knew about the belts, I’ll use mine to strangle you.”

Ren’s shoulders were still shaking with suppressed laugh.

“But imagine, soundproofed cabins.”

“I am imagining that. Nobody hearing you scream while I bash in your damned head.”

“Your idea of romantic getaway leaves much to be desired, General.”

Hux spun him around, slamming him into the wall, knowing full well how that would look to an outsider who’d only see those damned belts and there was no way in Malachor he  _ cared _ .

“This is not a getaway, Ren,” he said, low and precise. “We’re  _ run _ aways. We stay on the move, we keep low, and we stay together only as long as absolutely necessary and after that, I will gladly spend the rest of my life  _ never _ seeing your face again. Did I make myself clear?”

“Crystal,” Ren gritted through his teeth. Hux eased the pressure of his elbow on Ren’s windpipe and took a step back. Ren didn’t follow. 

 

*

 

The liquor shop was first in the row on the disembark deck, probably because the owner correctly guessed that you needed a stiff drink before you ventured any deeper into this seedy trading post.

That was also why Hux spotted the pair of bounty hunters walking down the ramp before anyone else did. Teldar gang - Hux would never mistake the weapons for anyone else’s. Brendol Hux used to hire them when he wanted to settle a score with someone in New Republic space. A capital mistake, to send anyone whom Hux would easily recognise.

They were professionals - no drinks until the job was done. They didn’t even look at the shop and they didn’t see Hux hiding behind the shelf of Tevraki whiskey as they walked past.

“... was here? There’s a half a dozen unidentified freighters at the docking ring. How–”

“Oh shut up. The client tells us to start here, I don’t make the rules.”

“A waste of time. I hope the  _ client _ is covering the expenses.”

“No, we’re splitting the bounty -  _ of course  _ he’s covering the expenses, moron. Would you finally shut up? We need...”

They headed in the direction of the trader’s office, and if the chatty droid wouldn’t sell them out, the drunkard Ssori surely would.

Hux was several lengths of corridor down the place he’d last seen Ren when he realised he didn’t have to fetch him. Surely he could figure out how to fly the spice freighter by himself. Ren was armed - and had his smuggling tricks - and the bounters most likely weren’t after him anyway… And Hux wanted to lose him here, didn't he? This was the perfect chance.

After a moment's hesitation, Hux turned around and slipped back into the docking section.

 

*

 

“Looking for someone?”

For the second time that day, Hux found himself pinning Ren against the wall. He let go as soon as he realised who'd startled him.

“As it turns out, you.” He tried to keep the disappointment out of his voice and wasn’t sure if he succeeded. This was the perfect chance - and of course Ren had to ruin it, sticking to Hux like bad luck.

The docking section was full of nooks and corners, half of the emergency lights turned off by the thrifty station owner. In the dark, Ren’s long arms wound around Hux’s waist and pulled - Hux’s breath was knocked out of his lungs when he found himself pressed against the wall in turn; Ren’s large silhouette looming over him.

“Interesting. You sure it’s not those two?”

Ren’s breath was tickling Hux’s ear, warm and distracting. Then he tilted his head to the side, just so, and Hux followed the direction with his gaze, peeking through the riot of Ren’s hair over his shoulder.

The door to this section hissed shut, leaving them alone with the pair of bounty hunters.

 

 


	12. Summer storm

Hux instinctively backed further into the nook, unintentionally pulling Ren with him. It was dark, the bounters haven’t spotted them yet, they weren’t expecting Ren - if he could make them pass by or at least come closer –

Hux hooked one leg around Ren’s waist, pulling them flush together, and buried his left hand in Ren's hair.

“Act convincingly,” he hissed when Ren’s first impulse was to jerk back. A little huff was his only response and then Ren’s hand slid up his tigh, hitching it higher, and a roll of Ren’s hips had Hux lifting off the floor.  

The surprised gasp Hux let out at that was definitely convincing. Ren was grinning now, their faces so close that Hux could see the dangerous gleam in his eyes, and the rustle of clothes and shuffle of Ren’s boots on the floor should be enough to cover–

“Moan for me,” Ren taunted, grin vicious like some sharp-toothed animal and Hux wanted to bite it right off his mouth. _Convincing,_ he thought and did just that.

Ren tasted like surprise, like Arkanis rain and warmth, like Tevraki whiskey and blood. For a second, he stood just frozen, unresponding - and then he surged up, giving back as good as he’s got, ferocity in place of finesse and wasn’t that just typical Ren? Their mouths fit so well together as if they always knew how to be like that, the feeling of _want_ nearly overwhelming–

Anger spiked in Hux in place of some more confusing emotion and he sank his teeth into Ren’s bottom lip, pulling hard.

The moan was loud and perfectly convincing. Hux’s eyes refocused on the approaching bounters and so he saw how their posture relaxed, heard the snicker, watched them come closer to make sure but already expecting just couple of romping drunks…

They hit the floor, unconscious, before they even noticed the blaster aimed at them under Ren’s arm.

“What kriffing idiot keeps their blaster locked on stun?” Hux swore and wriggled out of Ren’s hold, kicking him in the knee-cap when he wasn’t releasing him quickly enough to Hux’s liking. He walked over to the couple of incompetent morons, checking his gun. The kill switch was permanently reduced on stun, too. Oh great. Maybe the spicers didn’t want their child accidentally kill themselves, maybe they didn’t want to push for blood revenge in case they got into trouble - either way, it was bloody inconvenient.

“Well?” Hux looked up from where he was binding the men’s hands with their own belts. “Do you need a written order to help me or what?”

Ren’s face in the dark was hard to read. For a reason he couldn’t explain, Hux didn’t want to look at it too long.

“So this is how it’s going to be?” Ren asked, eventually. He sounded tired.

“What is your problem, Ren?”

“Never mind.” Ren heaved a great sigh and shook his head. As if _he_ was the one putting up with Hux’s presence and not the other way around. But he’d also finally decided to lend a hand, and Hux desperately wanted for this to be over, so he let it slide.

“Maybe it’s a good thing they aren’t dead,” Ren remarked after a while when both bounters were trussed up and free of anything of any value. “They were stupid, but their gang that would’ve come after us wouldn’t be.”

“They were rather shockingly careless,” Hux agreed. Rookies, probably, which wasn’t making much sense. “But what do you want to do with them? We can’t be taking prisoners.”

“The _Naboo Celebration_ hatch way is right behind you,” Ren said. “And the crew is currently trying to outdrink their captain.”

The idea had some merit.

“That’s idiotic. Even _you_ should be able to outdrink a Ssori. How much alcohol can that tiny body handle?”

“Superb alcohol processing enzymes.”

Together they carried the men aboard the pleasure cruiser and deposited them inside one of the soundproofed honeymoon suites. On his way out, Hux jammed the lock so that the door wouldn’t open, and then took those wretched spousal belts and wrapped them around the terminal in an impromptu ‘Do Not Disturb’ sign.

“I heard Eriadu is especially nice this time of year,” he smirked at Ren. “What’s our new ship?”

“Her name is _Lightning Bolt._ ”

Their new transport, courtesy of the unfortunate bounty hunters, was a Lancer class pursuit craft - fast, heavily armed and equipped with a military-grade shield. Hux thought the name suited her. He was also familiar enough with the controls layout to be able to fly it singlehandedly - which was fortunate considering that Kylo Ren vanished into one of the cargo bays as soon as they entered hyperspace. Walking past the locked door, all Hux could hear was indistinct noise - duraplast breaking, metal rattling, frustrated screams.

Reconnection with the Force obviously wasn’t going as expected.

 

*

 

Across the Galaxy, Luke Skywalker knelt at the edge of a patch of grass, the ground level and beaten down by countless steps of bare feet. Scattered around him were the remnants of two training sticks, splintered into thousand pieces.

A little further down the bushes lay his folded coat and atop of it, his lightsaber rested like a memento. Luke held out his hand. The lightsaber didn’t move.

Cracks in the ground, piercing deep into the island’s rocky core, spreaded from the spot where Rey stood. Loose rocks tumbled down the island slopes like tears rolling down her face, winds whipped the through her hair, grown trees breaking like sticks in time with her screams. Deep in the Force surrounding the island, a storm was brewing. 

 


	13. A not very reassuring means of transport

In retrospect, claiming the upper bunk bed had been a mistake, Hux thought. He threw his forearm across his eyes in a futile attempt to keep his eyes stay closed and eventually fall asleep. But the weak light coming through the vent above the cabin door wasn’t the problem keeping him awake.

No, the problem currently lay in the lower bed, long hair fanned out over the pillow, sleeping the sleep of the just. Which was unfair because out of the trillions of people in the Galaxy, Kylo Ren was one of the least likely candidates for the category of the just.

Hux had picked the upper bed for himself because he’d feared that the frame would not hold up against the weight of the likes of Ren. He didn’t fancy waking up flattened into the mattress in case the structure broke. Also Ren’s outburst of restless destruction was likely to carry on into the night and the upper bed creaked rather badly when you tossed and turned, and Hux would much rather prefer a quiet night.

Which was highly ironic, considering that Ren had probably exhausted himself enough to fall asleep soundly as soon as he hit the mattress, while Hux was still awake nearly three hours later and trying not to toss and turn too much - because that could wake up Ren, and he'd then laugh into Hux's face.

There was nothing Hux could criticise about their current sleeping arrangements. The bed, although creaky, was comfortable, with soft mattress and clean bedding. The temperature in the room was just right, the hum of the hyperdrive engine a distant and soothing lullaby, there was even a small sonic shower  - everything Hux could possibly need for a good night’s sleep.

Except that Hux had less trouble falling asleep in the ruins of the Academy, cramped in one dirty bed with Ren, hells - even on the back seat of a speeder bike, wrapped around Ren’s back - than he had now, in full comfort… and without Ren.

Hux lifted himself on his elbow and glared over the edge of the bed down on Ren’s innocently sleeping form. It was ridiculous. It must have been the fact that he’d spent last three nights in three different places and his subconscious had latched onto the single common variable - Ren.

Who, like the bastard he was, slept as if nothing troubled his mind at all, as if he hadn’t thought once about the fact that Hux kissed him…

Hux flopped back down and pressed the heels of his palms into his eyes until bright dots started dancing in his field of vision.

The kiss was a ploy, a tactic to lower the bounters’ suspicion, a pretence, ultimately nothing. Except that for a span of few seconds, it felt like everything.

Hux mentally smacked himself. A lapse in judgement, a naturally understandable overreaction to the adrenaline and _days_ of having nobody else to talk to; that’s what it was. Besides, all Hux was doing was playing a game.

And yet… he didn’t have to kiss Ren. They would have acted out the scene well enough with just a bit of grinding and loud breathing. But then Ren’s lips happened to be so close that Hux suddenly wanted to know if they were as soft as they looked, what would Ren taste like…

Ren tasted sweet like temptation and salty like impertinence, and above all heady like daring, like the excitement of finally having someone who could match Hux in strength and wit.

The kiss also left behind a sour aftertaste of mistake being made and a bitter lingering tang of regret. Because Ren would eventually get his Force back, and with it the cooperative, resourceful, quiet and _human_ Kylo Ren would be gone, replaced by the incomprehensible, haughty, self-important and isolated Knight.

Hux frowned at his own choice of words in his inner monologue. Isolated. That’s what Hux would be, too. That’s what Hux always was, alone at the top. Except now it would be the bottom. Hux could’ve accepted his fate and die a General, he chose survival and that inevitably meant exile.

The blanket rustled and frame creaked as Ren rolled in his bed, and again a couple of seconds later. Curious, Hux peeked over the edge again. In the low light, he could just about make out that Ren’s eyes were closed and his brow pinched, fists clenching and fingers digging periodically into the pillow, and his breath was coming out in fast, shortened puffs.

“No,” came an indistinct, pillow-muffled sob after another series of trashes. “Master, I–”

So Ren was dreaming about Snoke. Hux would be lying saying he didn’t dream about the Supreme Leader a couple of times himself since they ran away, even though those nightmares were short-lived and easily chased away by the feeling of Ren in his arms. Perhaps...

“I will not fail this test,” Ren mumbled again, the words getting clearer in his agitation. Hux briefly wondered what was it Ren was dreaming about: a reliving of the past, or a wishful future? Either way, Ren needed to be calmed down or nobody would be getting any sleep tonight, Hux reasoned with himself even as he slid down the ladder and leaned above Ren, his hand hovering over the troubled sleeper’s shoulder–

“He means nothing to me,” Ren said, low but clear, voice shaking a little with vehemence, and Hux’s hand froze.

 _A test…_ Was _everything_ of this just a test? Did Ren have the Force all the time, was their entire ordeal just a test, was this the real way to _complete his training_ –

Then Ren’s whole body convulsed in clear torment and Hux barked out - “Ren!” - and then his whole vision flashed technicolor, shapes dizzying and morphing for a seconds as his stomach lurched with a sudden change of momentum.

“Ren!” Hux shouted when the world righted itself again. Ren shot up into sitting position, eyes half-blind with fright and arms flailing.

“Did you do this?” Hux demanded, furious, uncaring of the lingering dread around Ren’s eyes, of the flinch at Hux’s harsh tone.

“What?”

“ _Something_ ’s pulled us out of hyperspace, that’s what! Right when you had a rather _intense_ dream about your precious Force!” Hux threw his arms around to illustrate his point. When he held his breath, the evidence was staggering: the low hum of the hyperdrive engines was gone.

Ren’s eyes widened. He’d reached for his jacket, as if to get up and check in the cockpit. The instinctive movement was stopped short by the sight of a blaster aimed at his head.

“You will stop the charade this instant,” Hux said, sick pleasure coursing through him at the multitude of emotions flicking over Ren’s face. Confusion - stupid, fear - understandable, anger - satisfying, and then - what, heartsickness?

“I don’t have it,” Ren said, deflating where he sat, his shoulders slumping and head bowing low.

“I don’t have the Force. But I understand it’s impossible to prove the _lack_ of an ability so go ahead.” He nodded towards the blaster. “I shouldn't have expected _this–_ ”, and he waved his hand in Hux’s vague direction, “to last anyway.”

“ _T_ _his?_ ” Hux repeated, his face heating.

“You,” Ren said, lifting his head with a hint of defiance. “You caring about someone else than yourself for a change.”

“Oh, _you_ have the gall to speak–” Hux spat out before the full implication of it hit him. He gripped his wrist with the other hand to steady his aim.

“What were you dreaming about?”

There was an unmistakable full body twitch this time, and Ren’s face darkened.

“Nothing of–”

“Everything of consequence,” Hux cut him off. “If I am to trust you, I need to know. I can’t go around wondering when will my decision to save you from Snoke blow up in my face. There is something you keep to yourself - and when you wouldn’t tell me on your own, now you’re telling me at gunpoint: _what were you dreaming about?_ ”

Ren’s face could have been cut out of stone when he said: “The death of my father.”

 _He means nothing to me…_ Hux felt his hand going weak, the blaster barrel tilting towards the floor.

“You killed him.”

Ren stood up, and Hux was suddenly very aware of the extra inches Ren had on him.

“I only did the very thing _you_ dreamed about doing your whole life,” Ren snarled as he pushed past Hux and left the cabin.

 

 


	14. Adventurous safari

A click of the tap, a soft gurgle of liquid poured into a glass, a muted clink of the glass being put on the table, a tiny squeak of wet glass bottom on the hard table surface - his drink being pushed towards him. Luke listened with his eyes closed, grasping onto each sound and interpreting them for what they were. For the first time in many years, he didn’t hear anything else beyond each of the individual sounds, no matter how hard he listened in the pauses. The silence remained silent.

A drag of a chair on the floor, a rustle of robes being gathered and pulled aside, the soft thud of a body settling wearily onto the seat, a sigh.

“Drink, before it gets warm,” his sister said.

Luke looked at his sister across the table and lifted his drink in a toast.

“You haven’t forgotten,” he said after he wiped away the milk clinging to his whiskers.

Leia rolled her eyes. “Your obsession with blue milk is unforgettable.”

Luke chuckled and drank some more, relishing in the sweetness cloying his tongue. It almost tasted like it did back on Tattooine, before Owen and Beru were killed, before Luke saw the sparks of a space battle in the sky, back when his life was nothing but moisture farming day in and day out.

Except it didn’t, because even then the Force had been with him. It was in the way he drove his speeder, faster and more daring than anyone else, it was why his sling never missed when they went shooting rats for sport. It was in the voice of the twin sunset, whispering to him about the stars when everyone else around him seemed resigned and happy with their lot on that pile of sand.

Back then, he’d felt a raw, unnamed potential within himself and was dying with frustration over life with seemingly no purpose.

Now he had purpose to spare. But it was his power that was gone.

“So you still have it,” he asked Leia. The question, _How_ , didn’t need to be spelled out.

“I only met her briefly,” Leia shrugged.

“And her friend?”

Leia frowned. “You know my power is unrefined,” she said. “I _thought_ I could sense something in him when I first met him, but he’s been in coma ever since...” she did not finish, her eyes briefly misting over with grief.

“It would look likely,” Luke said after a pause. “A single Stormtrooper suddenly able to tell right from wrong after a lifetime of programming to obey orders?”

Leia nodded thoughtfully. “But that doesn’t detract from his bravery,” she pointed out.

“Of course not. The Force guides us, it does not make our decisions for us.”

Leia leaned back in her chair, hands folded over her middle. All those years and her eyes hadn’t lost an ounce of their shrewdness.

“And where does the Force guide Rey?”

Not for the first time since he was abruptly pulled out of his self-imposed exile, Luke felt acutely diminished with this new situation.

“I don’t know,” he admitted. “She was distraught - terrified when she realised what happened. I tried to calm her down. The next thing I know, I wake up in Millennium Falcon, Chewie high-tailing it away from Ahch-To as fast as he could.”

“Well,” Leia shifted forward, “she can’t leave the planet without a ship, so–”

Luke put his hand on hers, holding back her eagerness.

“You forget I once arrived there on a ship,” he said wryly. “I locked it down and hid it - but Rey’s powers developed far beyond anything I’ve ever seen, and I don’t think that Force retrocognition is out of her reach now. She’ll be able to find it and unlock it using my lingering memories from the time I last touched it.”

“But still–”

“And even if she couldn’t,” Luke drew a deep breath, “she will be calling for help. And even if we can’t hear her, there are beings who can - and will.”

Leia shuddered. _Snoke_. One Force abomination meeting another.

“There’s one more thing, Leia,” Luke said, trying to be as gentle as he could. “You thought I was dead, when this happened.”

Leia tightened her mouth into uncomfortable line. “I told you my power is unrefined,” she said. “I lost my sense of you in the Force. Forgive me if I assumed–”

“Nothing to forgive,” Luke interrupted her. “But, Leia, what if Ben– Rey told me he was still alive when she saw him last.”

“I know,” Leia replied, her whole face now scrunched in clear distress. “That was the first thing I thought of when you turned up alive– but Luke, I have no idea where he might be.”

 

*

 

“This system is not on the charts.” Ren was scowling at the star maps slowly rotating above the holoprojector as if they personally offended him.

“That’s probably why the gravitational well of the planet pulled us out of hyperspace,” Hux said. It was a roundabout amendment of his previous accusation and as such it failed utterly short, wilting in the face of Ren’s unforgiving mood.

“The question is why,” Ren continued. “This isn’t Unknown Regions, not even Wild Space. We’re still deep within Outer Rim territories. Whatever hides in here, it has been hidden on purpose.”

Hux busied himself with the scanners. “Well, it seems abandoned,” he observed. “No orbital beacons, no signs of energy field signatures anywhere on the surface. I’m picking up lifeforms but nothing that would indicate a sentient species - a concentrated settlement or a– wait a minute.” Hux frowned at the display of data.

“There seem to be ruins of a city on the northern hemisphere,” he said at last. “The marches have taken over the lower levels and the jungle had claimed the rest but it’s definitely there. Massive structures, in places.”

“Like temples?”

Hux converted the data to display on the three-dimensional holoprojector and frowned some more when the shapes remained blurred and flickering, as if the signal rendering them was faulty.

“Something’s interfering with the sensors,” Hux ran the diagnostics on the signal but found no evidence of artificial design. “Some natural field. Could be a leftover radiation from whatever war destroyed this city.”

“We shall see,” Ren announced, grabbing the helm and keying in an atmosphere-entering course.   

“Ren, we cannot make a stop at every waterhole you happen to fancy.”

“This planet is off the charts, General,” Ren smirked. “Nobody would be looking for us here. We can afford a little detour.”

Hux narrowed his eyes at him. “You’re not telling me everything.” Ren, so hell-bent on investigating a rotten, swamp-ridden world? He had to know something Hux didn’t.

“How am I supposed to trust you when–”

“Oh, General,” and now Ren was openly sneering, “we both know you don’t need to trust me as long as you have your blaster.”

Hux suppressed a stab of guilt at his earlier outburst. Yes, he’d made a mistake. He finally found Ren's sore spot, and he hit it full force. But Ren was really wringing it beyond what it was worth.

“Honestly, Ren,” he sighed, making a show from giving all the controls over to Ren’s pilot seat, “you act as if it was the first time I threatened you. Weren’t you paying attention those last six years?”

Joking, apparently, wasn’t cutting it either. Ren remained sullen when he replied: “After all we’ve been through I hoped holding me at gunpoint wouldn't be your go-to reaction whenever something goes wrong.”

 _All that we’ve been through was a direct outcome of my decision to save your sorry arse,_ Hux thought viciously. It occurred to him after a while that Ren couldn’t hear that thought the way he used to, whenever Hux used deliberate projection to insult Ren _and_ present a united co-commanding front to the crew at the same time. By the time Hux realised he’d have to say it aloud, the perfect opportunity for the comeback has come and gone. Disappointed, Hux burrowed deeper into his seat and prepared for landing.

  


*

 

The planet’s surface was one big rank jungle, the ground beneath their boots boggy, the vegetation covering almost every square mile with a deep, damp forest. Trees with wide, entwining branches created a natural roof and the air trapped underneath it was stifling and gloomy, with very little daylight coming through. Hux thought he saw birds, some large insects, and something that looked like big greenish-brown four-eyed furry lizards clinging to the trees.

Hux stopped short, nearly tripping over a tree root. He knew the species. He’d never been onboard of the _Chimaera_ , but he’d seen enough holos taken of Grand Admiral Thrawn’s flagship - and of his office.

Ren strode past the animals without even noticing them. That alone, more than any of his claims, finally convinced Hux that Ren wasn’t lying about the loss of his Force sensitivity. Hux pulled out his vibroblade and smiled to himself.  

Perhaps stopping at this strange safari wasn’t such a bad idea. Even if Ren didn’t find anything to his satisfaction, Hux already had a present for him. He refused to think of it as of an apology for his earlier misstep. But if Hux knew Ren well enough to know how to piss him off, he also knew how to win him back. With a useful present - a pet, of sorts. One that would not harm or affect Ren in any way - but would mean the beginning of the end for any of the Knights of Ren, should they ever meet them again.

 


	15. Jaws

Getting those stubborn reptiles off their tree was harder than anticipated. In the end Hux had to saw off the entire chunk of the branch they occupied and carry the whole lot of it into the shuttle. Of course Ren didn’t wait for him.

Hux hitched the stun gun higher on his shoulder and swore when his foot went through a seemingly solid looking patch of green grass and ended up knee-deep in swampy water. Walking in this terrain was a nightmare, a creepy, oppressive, with bloodthirsty midgets filled nightmare.

At least the wet ground made for easy tracking. Ren’s footprints were heavy and purposeful, trailing in a more or less straight line towards the huge structure they saw on their scanners earlier. The air felt even fouler that way. Hux wasn’t a man to listen to his gut feeling. Spur-of-the-moment decisions and instincts could win a fight but battles were won by careful planning and anticipating every turn. But something about this place was making the hair at the back of his neck stand on end.

The track suddenly emerged into a clearing. The ground was more solid here, a little top rising above the swamp. It was covered with rich, emerald grass and littered with bones.

Human - and some of them near-Human. One of them still had the remnants of breathing mask attached to their skull. Another had hearing implants. Decades old skeletons, picked clean by time and small animals, most of their clothing disintegrated in rain and wind. Hux saw that Ren’s footprints halted briefly by one of the remains. Something glinted in the grass.

Hux picked it up. It was covered with rust and cracked but after dealing with Ren for six years, he’d recognise the cylindrical shape anywhere. It was a lightsaber.

He tried to ignite it - no doubt like Ren did. A click could be heard from the inside of it but otherwise nothing happened. Broken or too decayed to function.

Now when Hux knew what to look for, he could see the marks on the bones. Black burns through the chest, the ribs vaporized in a clear round hole. Blackened edges of severed long bones of the limbs. He noticed the pattern in which the bodies once hit the ground. He was looking at a battlefield. And whoever that Force user was - Jedi or Sith - he’d put up a hell of a fight before he fell.

Ren’s footprints led further, his paces now shorter, hastier. Hux swore under his breath. He couldn’t shake off the feeling that Ren was heading straight into trouble.

And yet he was wrong, Hux realised when he spotted another set of footprints joining Ren’s from the side. Some four-legged, sharp-clawed animal. Its paws let their imprints over Ren’s. Ren wasn’t heading into trouble - trouble was going to sneak upon him from behind.

A blood-chilling howl pierced the thick air somewhere further ahead. Hux gripped his gun tighter. If these beasts hunted in a pack…

The track led him through the undergrowth, thorny vines wrapping around his calves and some getting through the sturdy fabric leaving prickles that stung and itched, until at last he stumbled out of the forest into another clearing. Momentarily blinded by the sudden brightness, Hux crouched down into the waist high grass and tried to blink the sunlight out of his eyes.

Ren had apparently found whatever he was seeking. A massive, foreboding stone structure rose from the ground, spreading wider and towering higher than Hux could see from this perspective, its outline blurred with fog. Paved steps led from here to the steep heights, broken and eroded in places, and at the bottom of the stairway knelt Ren - facing the forest, eyes closed, brows set in deep concentration, one arm outstretched in front of him.

A lithe, four-legged beast with deeply set, glowing eyes and long, swishing tail, was slowly approaching him.

Hux nearly cried out in frustration. What was Ren doing? The beast was clearly hunting him, prowling to the best spot for attack, head and shoulders already lowered and muscles coiled in preparation for a jump - and Ren was just - stock still, like a sitting duck, ignoring every danger. If he was trying to establish some kind of mental link with the animal, as far as Hux could see, he was failing.

Hux readied the stun gun, bracing it against his shoulder, and pulled the trigger at the same time the beast sprang.

The gun only spat a weak spark instead of a blast - and in the next moment, Ren was knocked down on his back, the weight of the beast on his chest and its snapping jaws going for his throat. The look of utter dumbfounded surprise on his face should have been recorded for the ages, Hux thought. But then his chest swelled with rage at such idiocy and the feeling was rash and powerful enough to silence the tiny but sharp shiver of fear… He threw away the useless gun and grabbed his vibroblade, lunging into the fray.

The beast was snarling, yellowish foam dripping from its maw where Ren held it by the throat at arms length, trying to fight off the claws that tore through his clothes. Hux’s first strike barely grazed its flank and the second one failed to draw blood either, the blade slipping uselessly along the beast's thick skin. The tail, snake-like and flared at the end, kept getting in Hux's way, whipping into his face as if it was a limb with a mind of its own. Ren was shouting something-

“Cut it off! The tail, cut it off!”

Just in time, Hux had spotted the venomous stinger at the tail’s end and swiped after it with such force the blade cut through the bone and embedded itself in the crumbling stone steps.

Cursing, he tried to pull it out, but then there was no need. As if struck by lightning, the beast turned into a whimpering, cowering lump, backing away from the fray with the bleeding stump drawn between its legs. Within moments, it disappeared back into the jungle.

Ren sat up, his movements wobbly and eyes unfocused. Hux let go of the stuck blade and turned on the colossal idiot instead.

“What were you thinking?” he yelled. He wanted to punch some reason into Ren, make him bleed until he listened. “That was a kriffing vornskr!”

Ren didn’t even flinch when Hux grabbed him by the shoulders and shook him, still looking around with wide, dazed eyes. Hux considered slapping him but drew his hand back in the last second, going for the fastenings of Ren’s tunic instead and pulling it apart to check for scratches. If the thing had venomous claws too…

“I felt it,” Ren babbled, “I felt it, it was coming back, I thought I could make a connection through the Force, I could feel myself in its head, taming it- why did it attack? It should’ve worked.”

“You thought the Force was coming back to you?” Hux spat, utterly sick with a suffocating mix of rage and relief.

“Yes,” Ren blinked up to him, more than ever reminding Hux of a stray dog. “This place. We're on Dromund Kaas, the lost capital of ancient Sith empire. There's a nexus of Dark Force in that temple, it's all around-”

So that's what the headache was for, and the gun malfunction, Hux realised. And Ren, desperate to get his power back, not only didn't tell Hux of the dangers inherent to this place - he'd nearly fallen prey to them himself.

“Vornskrs are Force sensitive,” Hux began, as if explaining to a small child.

“I know, that's why-”

“It wasn't letting itself be tamed by you, it was hunting you!” Hux exploded. “You weren’t in its head, it was in yours! It's the kriffing Force equivalent of a snake stare and you nearly let it rip off your throat, you imbecile!”

Ren swayed on the spot, his expression of deep heartsickness and blind, desperate determination.

“Maybe this place is calling to me, I just need to learn how to listen - but I have to try."

"You'd try to get yourself eaten?"

"You don't understand!" Ren shouted. "Without the Force, I am nothing.”

That was the last straw. Hux could feel his blood boil over. If his anger was fed by the Dark Force well nearby, making him finally snap, he didn't care. He just needed to drive a point through that impossibly thick skull of his companion.

“You were nothing - nothing but a nuisance when you had the Force!” he yelled. And once the floodgates were open, he couldn't stop.

“If you can't see how much you've already grown since you lost it, you are blinder than an Arkanis eel! You are good pilot, competent fighter, quick thinker and an actually, impossibly reasonable man, and I'm getting sick thinking you could have been all that the whole time you haunted my ship shrouded in your stupid Force. All those resources we wasted on you and for what? For you to lose the first serious duel you got into? That Force wizardry doesn't look very impressive from where I am standing and if you think your life makes no sense without it, you are even bigger fool than I ever imagined!”

A faint echo rang out, finishing Hux’s rant, and he snapped his mouth shut with an audible click. He said far more than he ever should, and judging from Ren's stupefied face, the man didn't miss a word.

“Is that what you keep telling yourself?” Ren asked at last, his voice low and wondering. He looked completely sobered now, his eyes narrowed, and Hux tried to brace himself for whatever insult was coming.

“That all the resources poured into the construction of a weapon that only fired once doesn’t make you an utter waste of space? That your life will make some sense outside of First Order, _General_?”

Despite knowing it was coming, the words still felt like a slap to the face. Wordlessly, Hux turned on his heel and began the tedious hike back to the ship. If Ren was saying something - if he was following - Hux refused to care.


	16. Experimental space cocktails

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This is the chapter where this fic earns its rating. Come on, you've all been waiting for it.

Ren sneaked into the cockpit some time after they took off and then he just hovered there, silent, rubbing the scratches on the back of his hand. Hux’s first thought was ‘You should put antiseptics on that’ and then he looked away, biting his tongue. He was done playing nursemaid.

“I am sorry,” Ren blurted out. “I should have told you what kind of place was that. You saved my life - again - and I'm not used to people caring whether I am alive or not without any ulterior motives…”

He trailed off, obviously expecting Hux to say something in turn. As usual, leaving all the emotional mess for Hux to sort it out. Hux was done with that, too.

“Apology noted,” he said coldly and continued keying in the space jump calculation. In the transparisteel reflection, he saw Ren’s face crumble, and took a little satisfaction in that.

They were several hours on the way to a backwater Outer Rim world with good chances for disappearing when Ren emerged from whatever nook of the ship he'd been hiding, carrying several colourful bottles and two tall glasses.

Well. Hux wouldn’t say no to a drink. Especially when he had time to think on why did he lose his nerve like that, back there in front of the temple ruins. It wasn't just that Ren didn't tell him about the danger - that was understandable, considering Hux had made it clear earlier he didn't trust Ren in the first place. There was something else too - the whole truth was scary but all of the things Hux was done with, being a coward was on top of the list. Now he only needed the liquid courage to face it, get it over with and put it to rest.

“I shouldn't have said what I did, too, about the Force,” he started, half way into the first glass of some experimental cocktail of Ren’s design. It was spicy and sweet at once, and it loosened Hux’s tongue just the way he needed. “I don’t understand the Force, I shouldn't judge it from the standpoint of ignorance.”

“Apology accepted,” Ren quipped over the edge of his glass and Hux couldn’t be sure but Ren might have been hiding a smile there, too. Hux didn’t know how much he missed the crooked little smile until he glimpsed it again and something in his chest twinged at the sight.

“Did you mean it?” Ren asked after he refilled their glasses. “What you said there - about me. Being competent. Useful.”

“If you're fishing for any more compliments you're in for a long night,” Hux said and downed the second drink. It was far too soft, just like Ren's eyes over the rim of his glass.

Hux busied himself making a cocktail of his own, sniffing each of the bottles and adding liberal amounts of those that smelled he strongest. The result was like a liquid fire down his throat that quickly transformed into comfortable warmth. He could feel his usual mental barriers melting.

“You were right, in a way,” he admitted. “I might be keeping saving your life just because as long as you're here, I don’t have to think about myself, about what has become of my life. I can fuss about your wounds and where you sleep and how you call me instead of looking at my own future because I am not sure there even is one."

He took a large gulp. Honesty was draining. 

"I don't think I can bear thinking about it just yet. Maybe if there's chance for you there must be one for me too..."

Stars, he was making it sound so damn selfless. How did Ren say it? Caring for someone else than himself for a change? Hux wasn’t a selfless man.

"Maybe I just don't want to be alone," he admitted at last.

“I know, Hux,” Ren said simply and before Hux could process hearing his name out of Ren’s mouth for the first time, Ren kissed him.

The first touch landed amiss, just on the corner of Hux’s lips. Ren’s mouth was warm and sloppy with drink, he pulled away and immediately came back, and with it also Ren's hand on Hux's cheek, big and warm, insisting.

Hux should’ve pushed him away. But his mouth took over his brain and instead of protest, it hummed in assent and then Ren angled their mouths better and Hux clutched tighter, leaning forwards. He opened his mouth, tiny noise escaping him when Ren sucked his lower lip into his mouth and ran his tongue over it, again, and again, until it tingled, ached for more.  
  
“Kiss me,”  Ren breathed. Hux hummed something that might have been yes and grabbed a handful of Ren’s thick hair, letting his tongue slide against Ren's and finally getting his fill of what he only had a taste that first time back on the Kemal station.

And then Ren stood, all too soon, leaving Hux dizzy with the drink and the kiss and cold with the sudden absence of both. Hux bit his tongue to stifle the protesting sound that should have come sooner. He didn't want to look up. He did anyway. Ren was still standing there, swaying a little and reaching out to play with a loose strand of Hux’s hair, smoothing it away from his forehead.

“You’re going to deny this again in the morning, don't you,” Ren said, soft and wry at once, with that amused half-smile of his that made Hux’s stomach lurch. He swallowed.

“Maybe, he admitted. “This is just frustration. Stress relief. Attraction born from lack of other options.”

“Probably,” Ren agreed. “But if you can be fine with tonight, I will be fine with the morning.” And then he was gone, the door to the living quarters sliding shut after him.

Hux looked at his empty glass. He should get another drink. But then, on the whole ship, there wasn't anything more addictive than Ren's mouth, and Hux was an outlaw now. He could take what he wanted.  
  
He walked through the door, nearly losing his footing on the first unsteady step and then entirely when he was pulled abruptly through and pressed against the wall. Ren’s hands gripped his hips so tight Hux was sure he was going to bruise. Ren's fingers slipped under Hux’s jacket, under all his layers, and slid up towards his ribs. Hux could feel each point of contact like a lick of fire.

Ren's mouth was just made for kissing. It tasted like alcohol and spiced cream and the very opposite of loneliness. We should stop, Hux thought. I can handle being alone. He kissed Ren again.

“Bed,” he murmured into Ren's mouth.  
  
Ren brought their bodies flush together, grinding them against one another, and Hux could feel him hot and thick through his leggins. He gasped, arching into the pressure but Ren was pushing him off and stepping away, yanking on his own belt.  
  
“Yes, yes,” he was saying, scrambling out of his clothes and Hux was too drunk or too excited to help, hands shaking so much he barely managed his own clasps and buckles.  
  
And then Ren was naked, his body like an uncharted territory, pale upper arms dotted with dark moles like a star map in reverse colours. Everywhere else, his body was littered with silvery scars amids dark hair and  Hux wanted to touch and name and claim every spot on this strange landscape.

He wasn't nearly done staring his fill when Ren snatched him around the waist and pulled him down onto the bed, onto himself, and they ended up in a messy tangle of limbs that felt like falling long after they made contact with the sheets. Hux’s head was spinning and he grasped at Ren's shoulders to steady himself.

Ren was so warm under him, his skin soft and supple over the hard muscle of his stomach, and hot and paper-thin over his collarbones, flushed pink and irritated red where Hux’s beard scratched it. Hux sucked on Ren’s throat, rubbed his beard over the sensitive skin, savouring every tremble and every whimper like a personal victory.  
  
The feel of Ren went from warm to burning when Hux started moving: small, experimental rolls of his hips against Ren's. Ren spread his legs, hitching one up and wrapping it around Hux’s waist, and Hux dipped a little and could feel himself slotting into the crease between Ren’s belly and thigh, right next to his cock, trapped between soft and hard, twitching flesh. Ren's hands slid down to cup his arse, squeezing and pushing, urging him on.  
  
“More,” Ren gasped, low and breathless. “Please, Hux, touch me-”  
  
Ren had no shame, begging like that, and Hux couldn’t deny him if he tried. He lifted himself up on his elbows and knees, nudging Ren's thighs further apart, and sneaked a hand between them, watching Ren's eyes squeezed in pleasure, his soft mouth, kiss swollen and panting. He dragged his nails through the hair on Ren’s abdomen and lower and Ren almost sobbed, arching into the touch. His legs tightened around Hux’s when Hux’s fingers found his cock, and Hux could feel the twitch and spurt of precome when he closed his hand around it, stroking lightly from root to tip.  
  
He wasn't going to last, probably neither of them was, judging from the way Ren trembled and panted at every stroke, every pass of Hux’s thumb over the wet, dripping head. But damn it all, Hux wanted to see it, he wanted to see Ren come apart, and so he ignored the sparks of pleasure spreading from every point of contact between them and stroked Ren harder, faster-

“Hux,” Ren gasped out and then his hands were clutching at Hux’s waist, fingers digging in, hips lifting off the sheets in an aborted thrust and Hux felt him, felt the twitch and pulse of wet warmth over his knuckles, saw the desperate scrunch of Ren’s face and the way his jaw dropped afterwards, slack and sated.  
  
Hux let go of him and brought his hand up, smearing the mess over Ren’s lips and pushing it into his mouth. Ren opened up and sucked Hux’s fingers down, licking his own come from them and the sight of his pink tongue obediently cleaning Hux’s fingers was almost enough. Hux moved frantically now, fucking against Ren's slick and spent cock, every little whimper of overstimulation Ren made bringing him closer to finish. A name teetered at the edge of his lips when he came and he bit down on Ren’s shoulder,  filling his mouth with the salty taste of him so that no sound could make it out.

 

*

*

 

The next morning, Hux came to himself in increments: the dull ache behind his eye sockets from too much drink, the horrid taste of his own mouth, the sobering chill when last night's activities crept back into his memory and at last, a hot and insistent arousal spreading from his groin like remnants of a very vivid dream.

Then Ren shifted next to him, slotting his long warm body alongside Hux’s and sneaking a hand down, closing it over Hux’s erection.

Oh. Not a dream, then. Hux’s first impulse to thrust into Ren's fist got mixed up with the impulse to pull away and in the end he remained frozen the way he was.

“Could you not yet?” Ren murmured, his fingers dancing up and down Hux’s length delicious and maddeningly not enough.

“Not what?”

“Not overthink it,” and then Ren's lips closed around Hux’s nipple, his hand tightened around Hux’s cock, and Hux decided he could postpone morning for a little longer.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Art by the amazing [creepycreepyspacewizard](https://creepycreepyspacewizard.tumblr.com/), so beautiful I am still staring at this at least ten minutes a day just to lift up my mood:)


	17. Mitaka to the rescue!

It was odd, Hux mused, what difference a night of drunk sex made. Not that he and Ren would grow, stars forbid, _intimate_ overnight. In fact, Ren had the good grace not to mention it and keep his thoughts to himself ever since they finally rolled out of bed, a surprising but pleasant fact that Hux was eternally grateful for.

But something definitely changed. Just mere existing around Ren in the cramped space of their ship stopped to feel like keeping one’s hand above burning candle to see how long you would hold out until you had to snatch your hand away. Now it seemed as if they found a way to fit into the ship, both at the same time, learning how to move around each other without bumping against their respective edges.

Before, the silence between them would be filled with things that Ren didn’t talk about and Hux didn’t want to even think about. The weight of it would press down on the back of Hux’s mind, an ever-present itch that he would try to scratch - usually by needling Ren, fishing for a fight with barbed words, looking for a way to get a rise out of him, _anything_ to make the too loud silence shut up. Now, sitting next to Ren and not talking felt almost companionable.

Ren was concentrating on piloting their ship through a dense asteroid belt in the Dubrillion system. They had to fly at sublight speed and pilot manually due to the unpredictable debris cluttering the space but on the upside it made for a good hiding spot. A lot of not strictly legal mining was going on here and people tended to mind their own business. Hux made use of their time out of hyperspace with monitoring long range communications to get a clearer picture on what was going on in the Galaxy.

There was disconcertingly… little of it. The lack of any action on the side of New Republic was understandable, dissolved as it was in administrative chaos and toothless after the annihilation of the better part of its Fleet. But Hux had been expecting more rallying from the Resistance, and above all, more repressive action from the First Order. High Command should be regrouping the fleet, securing their positions at the outskirts of the Outer Rim, preparing for open war, not just… waiting.

And lastly, the most disturbing question: what was everyone waiting for?

Hux almost missed Ren’s abilities now. Even a vague statement about “a disturbance in the Force” would be better than _not knowing_. What Hux wouldn’t give for a simple, everyday briefing by one of his subordinates right now.

They had finally zig-zagged their way out of The Belt, Ren looking over their average speed with a little smug smile when the sensor controls panels suddenly shrieked to life. Out of the void in front of them, like a dagger carving out a place for itself amidst the stars, materialized a Star Destroyer.

Oh, but Hux would have known the class, the shape anywhere. He should start to think twice about his wishes.

“They’re hailing us,” Ren murmured. 

Hux thought quickly. Not responding would mean a quick solution of the problem they posed, and Hux hadn’t spent the past week traipsing through the rear end of the Galaxy to find the end to his exile at the business end of Finalizer’s turbolasers.

“Set our com on audio only. Can you voice modulate our transmission?” he hissed.

“No need,” Ren shook his head as he thumbed open the communication channel. Belatedly, Hux remembered that Kylo Ren used to wear a mask and that nobody on the Finalizer actually ever heard his true voice.

_“Lightning Bolt. Report on the status of your mission. Why haven’t you delivered the fugitive yet?”_

Hux swallowed back a snort. The voice was unmistakably Mitaka’s - and that question meant it was him who’d sent the bounty hunters after his former General. Not that Hux begrudged him this - he would have done the same if it meant a move up in the ranks. But he’d honestly expected better choice of tools from his favourite officer. Mitaka had always showed potential, passed the Academy with flying colours - and now he couldn’t even hire proper bounters?

“Not our fault, buckethead,” Ren drawled and Hux had to clamp a hand across his mouth. Ren’s Wild Space accent was hilarious. “Red wasn’t where you told us. We tracked’im up here but man, The Belt is a maze. We need more time.”

“ _Negative. We’ll be taking over from here. Our fighters will search through the asteroid field. You’re dismissed._ ”

“Hey! What about our pay?” Ren bellowed even as Hux tried to mouth at him, _for stars sake Ren don’t push it._

“ _Your lack of success won’t be taken into consideration in our appreciation of your service. Consider that your payment. Finalizer off._ ”

Except that, the channel remained active. The next incoming transmission had an extra layer of encryption. Hux took one look at it and frowned.

“That’s my personal code,” he muttered. He used this encryption to send messages through the channels in his office.

“Stand ready for jump,” he instructed Ren and checked the sensor readings on Finalizer’s weapon systems. All offline. It seemed as if they were truly dismissed, except for that one innocently-blinking message.

Hux couldn’t resist. He no longer had his code cylinders but he knew this particular decryption by heart.

“ _If you can decode this, I assume my plan was successful… sir._ ”

Hux instinctively backed out of the range of their holo cam before he remembered they hadn’t put it on. Above the com screen, small holo image of Lt. Mitaka was blinking up, alternately puffing up with satisfaction and biting his lip.

So _that’s_ why the bounty hunters were so exceptionally inept. They were meant to get overpowered, and their ship stolen. Hux mentally re-evaluated his opinion about Mitaka. Out of the corner of his eye, he could see Ren sliding out of his seat to move out of their cam range and motioning to Hux, _go on_.

“It was indeed,” Hux said, switching the holo on. Mitaka instantly beamed.

“ _So good to see you, sir,_ ” he said emphatically.

“I am not that anymore.”

The tiny blue-gray Mitaka wrung his hands. “ _Yes, si.. Yes. But you’ve been always good to us. And the Order owes you so much - you deserved a medal, not court-martial… anyway. I wanted to warn you. I won’t be able to commit treason for much longer.  I can keep the Finalizer here for as long as it takes to comb through The Belt but afterwards you’re free target, and they won’t let me choose the tools again._ ”

Hux understood. They might even want to change ship soon, especially if the original crew of the Lightning Bolt had already arrived to Eriadu.

“What’s the strategy of the First Order?”

Mitaka looked hesitant. “ _I… don’t actually know what to tell you. The Supreme Leader–_ ” and now his face paled so distinctly it was visible even through the washed out shades of the holo, “– _there’s been a purge in the Fleet command. I’ve seen several officers who disagreed with his course of action drop dead where they stood, across the parsecs– and we’re not fighting the Republic, sir. Not even the Resistance. Supreme Leader seems to be looking for something, and it’s far worse than the time with the map to Skywalker. The Finalizer’s been only spared the blanket hunt because he also wants you dead._ ”

Hux shot a brief glance at Ren’s face, a mask of worry etched in blue light and shadows under the deep set of his eyebrows, across the downturned bow of his mouth. He could read the man’s thoughts even without the Force.

“What about the Order of Ren?”

 _“Them? Oh - they won’t give you trouble.”_ The tiny rendering of Mitaka looked over his shoulder, bird-like, before he turned back. Nervous. Pressed for time. Hux almost felt bad for putting him at risk, questioning him for so long. Almost. He needed the information.

“ _Nobody knows anything definite but the word is that they are masterless. Rogue. They seem to have an agenda of their own. They even attacked and disabled one of our cruisers when we tried to apprehend one of them near Jakku..._ ”

Mitaka trailed off, once again distracted. Hux’s memory instantly provided the regular pattern of patrols, the sound of heavy armored boots rising up in the corridors, passing the door and fading again.  

“ _I gotta go,_ ” Mitaka whispered. “ _Been here long enough. Good luck, sir._ ”

“Good luck to you, Lieutenant. And don’t forget to wipe the com logs.”

The last Hux saw of Mitaka was his small smile before the hologram faded out into nothingness. Mechanically, Hux keyed in the jump. The Finalizer made no move to stop them. When they entered hyperspace, Hux’s eyes met Ren’s, two slivers of cautious gleam in the suddenly dimmed cockpit.

“I wonder what happened on Jakku,” Ren said slowly.

“Nothing good ever happens on Jakku,” Hux shook his head. “This whole disaster began on Jakku, if you remember.”

“People always come back home,” Ren said, totally without sense. His gaze seemed to pass through Hux for several moments before his eyes refocused, his head tilting. “Even you did.”

“I went to Arkanis Academy to blow it up,” Hux deadpanned. “You’re keeping something to yourself again. Just to be clear, I’m not going to Jakku.”

“Of course not. We’re going to Malachor.”

Ren had dropped the name with such confident matter-of-factness that Hux was half-way to nodding before the meaning caught up with him.

“What?!”

“It’s where the Order of Ren gathers when...” Ren started to explain and then seemingly ran out of words, or maybe he just weighed them to find the right one. “It’s closest we can call to a home.”

“Oh, so the little broken Knight wants to go home?” Hux taunted, suddenly angry. How _dare_ Ren speak of _home_.

“I thought you were scared of them.”

Hux wasn’t fast enough to evade Ren grabbing his arm, fingers digging into the soft flesh with punishing force. He fought to keep the wince of pain from showing on his face but as soon as Ren got a breath in, his fingers loosened again. His thumb rubbed over the sore spot almost apologetically.

“You should be scared of them too,” he murmured. “But, Hux… you have allies. And if there’s a chance for me to have some as well… I have to know.”

And maybe, Hux thought, keenly aware of the hand that now slid down his forearm, fingers brushing over the bare skin of his wrist, drawing little patterns over his thudding veins - maybe Ren’s allies could become Hux’s, too. It never hurt to have more.

 

 


	18. The super boring museum

Malachor was a wasteland. Reddish, dust-covered rocks stretched on miles, the cracks between them forming chasms that kept even their echo to themselves. The air was breathable but barely, sand and something finer that Hux didn’t want to analyze too closely scratching at the back of his throat and forcing tears out of the corners of his itching eyes.

“What even lives here,” he grumbled, more sigh than a question.

“Nothing,” Ren replied anyway. Maybe he, too, disliked the strange, forbidding atmosphere of this place like a cloak thrown over their eyes, turning their very thoughts into sticky sludge. Even small talk was probably better than the scraping of dust under their soles, a crumbling matter that looked just too fine and too white to be a rock.  

“Even the kyber crystal that once powered the temple and that could be considered a living entity was destroyed years ago. This planet is devoid of life.”

Hux paused on another flight of steps. He'd lost count of how many levels they've already descended and still he wasn’t sure how close they were to the bottom, drowned in echoless darkness. Hux was never afraid of the dark but this one was giving him creeps. It wasn’t just a mere absence of light. This darkness had a kind of a presence around it. Walking through it felt like diving into a pool of cold black blood left behind by some creature that this temple’s stones spawned, nurtured and killed.

“Then how it’s not devoid of the Force as well?” Hux waved his hand around, like a curator in some ancient museum. The spot of light from their torch slid across the walls - words of some forgotten language flickered into existence and faded again. “Since the Force flows through all living things and binds them together and blah blah.”

“You actually paid attention,” Ren said and Hux couldn’t make out if he was genuinely touched or just mocking him.

“The Force lingers,” Ren explained. “Bound to objects… and in places. A great catastrophe happened here, millennia ago. The Sith defended their temple against the attack of the Jedi, and during the battle, the ultimate weapon - the temple itself - was activated, wiping all life from the surface of Malachor. The despair of it, the suffering… it still echoes through time.”

“Well, I can't hear a thing but believe me I have noticed the… relics.” Hux suppressed a shiver at the fresh memory of thousands of bodies, turned to stone in the moment of their death, forever petrified in their agony.

“The dark side is strong here,” Ren added eventually. “It called me here on my journey after…”

“After?”

“After I became who I am,” Ren said shortly and relapsed into silence again. A scrap of memory from their old life resurfaced in Hux's mind: Ren's nom de guerre, the Jedi Killer. Well, it made a sort of sense that after killing some Jedi you would want to strengthen your worldview by coming to a place which killed even more Jedi, Hux snickered to himself and trudged after Ren.

He’d caught up with him rather abruptly a couple of moments later when he collided with Ren’s broad back. The man was like boulder, bodily blocking the narrow corridor at the bottom of the staircase. Hux bit back a curse and peeked around him. With the torchlight off, he could make out a faint reddish glow coming from around a corner.

“They’re here,” Ren whispered. Hux held his breath and caught a wisp of deep voices, distorted both with distance and mechanical modulation. A long shadow passed over the floor in front of their hiding spot: a cloaked figure wearing a mask.

A roar of starfighter engines somewhere above interrupted whatever communing was going on in the ruined temple. Ren took the opportunity to sneak further inside. Hux cautiously followed. The cover of shadows and debris created a thick maze but the Knights possessed more than the five regular senses to sniff out an eavesdropper.

A gust of wind blew a handful of ash in Hux’s face. There was a crack in the roof. Or, more precisely, there wasn’t much of the roof left, and a sleek starfighter was now descending along the path some explosion once ripped through the temple. Ash and bone dust swirled under the landing thrusters.

A tall, black-clad man climbed out of the hatchway. His mask had a different design to Ren’s and he carried a staff with a stun head mounted to one end. His grip on the weapon was so tight it shook.

“Look. A dead man walks.”

The mechanical voice of one of the Knights rang out, the mocking edge clear despite its heaviness.

“I’m not dead, Nuad.” The newcomer huffed out through their vocoder. They came closer to the circle of the Knights and unclasped their helmet, revealing a bald, sharp-edged and gaunt face of a Pau’an male. The markings over his eyelids were still pale with young age and his deeply set eyes flickered with liquid fear.

“To the Force, you are, Tukh.”

“Tell us what happened,” another Knight cut off the no doubt rash retort forming in Tukh’s sharp-toothed mouth. Out of the corner of his eye, Hux could see Ren leaning forward, brow furrowed in anticipation.

“I followed the disturbance to Jakku. I found it - in the body of a young human girl walking through the graveyard of ships. She seemed to be looking for something.”

 _Home_ , Ren’s lips formed the silent word. Hux nodded.

“She attacked me as soon as she sensed me.”

“And you let a young untrained girl beat you?”

Hux gave Ren a very pointed look. Ren merely narrowed his eyes and said nothing.

“You weren’t there, Nuad,” Tukh was shaking again. “You haven’t felt it. I’ve never… The Force is so strong with her it’s unnatural. There’s Light - and Dark - and a ceaseless conflict - and there’s something else, something... bottomless and hungry. We fought - and suddenly I was deaf and blind, and the Force wasn’t responding. The wrecks around us were breaking and sinking into the sand and she laughed and howled and–”

“She’s an abomination,” one of the silent Knights said. “A leech. I thought those were a legend.”

“I don’t care what she is,” Tukh muttered. “I only know she shouldn’t be allowed to exist. You have to help me.”

“Help _you_?”

Hux’s breath caught. He didn’t like the tone of the big, broad walking armory of a Knight. Judging from the way Tukh’s lips curled away from his teeth in a snarl, he didn’t like it either.

“We are brothers.”

“Brothers only in the Force,” another Knight intoned. The semicircle of them began closing on the young Pau’an. His helmet clattered against the ground as he gripped his staff with both hands, knees bending in defensive position, eyes flicking between his former comrades.

“I will fight you!”

“You may try,” and with that, Tukh’s body lifted off the floor, suspended by an invisible hand around his throat. He scrambled and kicked, swinging his staff in a useless blow against the power of which he was now a helpless victim.

They would’ve probably drawn it out. Feasted on his fear, played a little game of cat and mouse, let him taste the hope and then crushed it. But Hux would never know because in the face of such brutal, idiotic _waste_ of an experienced fighter by a bunch of _religious maniacs_ he forgot to keep the lid on his emotions. He slipped - his self-control slacking ever since he didn’t have to guard his thoughts around Ren anymore. He tried to douse his anger - but too late, and now two masked Knights turned their face-plates towards his hiding spot. One of them growled something - and the other pulled out a long blade, bluish sparks dancing along the charged edge.

Hux didn’t stay to watch Tukh’s body fall to the ground, limp and lifeless. The opening of the tunnel was near, compared to the heavily armed Knights he was light on his feet, he could–

He found himself frozen on the first step, held in place by the Force. His stomach lurched and skin crawled over with revulsion even as a small hysterical part of him noted that Ren - _his_ Ren - for all the nuisance he was, never dared to do this to him. Perhaps merely out of respect for their shared command but Kylo Ren never used the Force against Hux.

The rest of Ren clearly didn’t have any qualms about that.

“And what do we have here?”

Be it through the mask distortion or a feature of this Ren’s own species, the female voice sounded like several entities speaking at once, grating with just the slightest bit out of sync.

Hux couldn’t move his head but somehow he didn’t need his eyes to confirm the fact that Kylo Ren was no longer at his side. The hysterical part of him crowed in bitter triumph - _of course_ Ren would leave him behind, trying to save his own skin. He probably vanished as soon as he saw the the Knights would show no mercy, not even to one of their own.

“It’s the fugitive,” another said. They dragged him out, into the circle of sick red light, his boots squeaking against the floor. He fought to keep his balance. He would not meet his death kneeling.

“The General. Snoke wants him.”

“What did you come here for, General?”

Hux coughed and found he could speak. “To seek allies,” he dared. “I heard you care for Snoke about as much as I do.”

The female Knight snorted a laugh through her helmet.

“You’ve come to the wrong place for that. We want no allies. We need none.”

“Yes, I’ve noticed you seem to think that,” Hux said as pleasantly as he could, sparing a glance to the puddle of blood slowly seeping from under Tukh’s body. Strangely, the death of a Force devotee in such a Force-imbued place should have been more… ground-shaking, Hux suspected. But in the end, it was nothing more than a squelch of flesh and dull thud against the floor. Poor boy didn’t even get immortalized in stone like his ancestors.

“Did Kylo tell you about this temple?” Then the Ren’s helmet tilted and she took a step closer. “Did he lead you here? Do you know something the Force doesn’t?”

Hux thought, feverishly fast. Telling them about Ren could save his life - but no. The Knights clearly took no prisoners and left no witnesses. Hux was dead already, the only chance he had was a chance for a petty revenge. Ren left him like a coward, the least Hux could do was to make sure he would join him in death. It was what Hux was raised to do, what he believed in as a General, it was what Kylo Ren himself would have expected of him.

 _Fuck that_. He looked the woman straight into the strip of metal of her visor and said: “Kylo Ren is dead.”

“Hmmm.” She lifted her hand. “You know I can get the truth out of your head.”

Hux gritted his teeth, bracing himself for the intrusion. There would be pain, he knew - prisoners used to scream during Ren’s interrogations. Her slender, claw-like fingers curled slightly, miming the grasping and ripping motion–

–and nothing happened. Hux blinked. Either she was _that_ good - or she couldn’t do it at all.

She growled, leaned forward, hand thrust forcefully mere inches from Hux’s face. Nothing wormed its way into Hux’s skull. And then another of the Knights gasped, and yet another fell to their knees. With an experimental push against the force holding him bound Hux realized he could move freely. Well, except for the dull end of a stun baton jammed between his shoulder blades. The Knight behind him was panting under their mask. He probably wasn’t even aware that he was gripping Hux’s shoulder, leaning against him with half of his weight.

Kylo Ren walked out of the corridor, striding directly towards them. Two fat, lazily blinking ysalamiri were wrapped around his shoulders. The Knights’ collective gasp was loud enough to drown a small one of Hux’s.

The Force-null field around the ysalamiri must have been at least fifty meters wide now. Kylo Ren stopped where he could see them all, nicely rounded in the aim of his blaster gun.

One of them gathered enough of their wits to fire at him - their hand shook so badly that Ren didn’t even need to dodge the shot. Ren, on the other hand, didn’t miss. He didn’t even blink when his former comrade fell to the ground, cradling the charred stump of their arm and whimpering in pain.

“Stop it! Make it stop!”

“You will release him,” Ren said calmly. The pressure between Hux’s shoulder blades disappeared. He rolled his shoulders and walked over to his companion, face carefully schooled to show nothing - no shame at his earlier doubts and certainly no relief or gratitude.

If Ren’s chest was heaving slightly faster from the mad dash up and back down the stairs, he must have been striving to hide it too.

“I could take you out one by one, right where you stand,” Kylo Ren intoned again in that dark, unfeeling voice. “The only difference between you and Tukh is that you’re still drawing breath.”

“We won’t follow you,” one of them pleaded. “Take your own path and we shall take ours. Our duty is to restore the balance of the Force.”

“Fools,” Kylo sneered. “The Force doesn’t care for you. It never did, and it never will.”

 

 


	19. The mosquitos strike back

“You thought I wasn’t coming back for you,” Ren said when they were preparing to leave the orbit of Malachor.

Hux folded his arms over his chest. “Oh please. There was a reason I took this pest aboard.” He gestured towards the ysalamiri, currently snoozing happily on their nutrient substrates.

Hux couldn’t be sure but it looked as if the half of Ren’s mouth away from him was pulled up in a smile. “You also told them I was dead.”

“A simple thank you would suffice, Ren,” Hux rolled his eyes, fully aware that he should be the one thanking Ren and oddly comfortable in the knowledge that Ren knew it. Hux didn’t have to spell out what Ren already knew.

“I still can’t believe it worked,” Hux yawned after a while, stretching. “Did they realise they still had their conventional weapons? The ysalamiri can’t stop a thrown blade.”

“Losing the Force brings about terrible mental discomfort,” Ren said after a while so long Hux was beginning to think he wasn’t going to reply at all. “You can get used to it… but you wish you didn’t have to.”

Ren’s hair kept falling into his eyes as he worked on the calculations and Hux took the excuse to stand up, move over to Ren’s seat, gather the overgrown strands in his hands and start on a simple braid. Ren stiffened at the sudden touch and pull and then relaxed, tipping his head back and closing his eyes. Hux’s nails scratched along Ren’s scalp as he worked.

“What is it like?”

“It’s… absence.” Ren sounded almost hypnotized and Hux smiled to himself, wondering what other reaction he might get pulling that hair in a slightly different setting. But Ren wasn’t done talking yet.

“At first, it’s like a loss of a limb - or a sense. Frightful and so acute it hurts. Later… it’s like homesickness. All you can feel is a terrible sense of  _ missing _ .”

“You can learn to live without a part of yourself.”

“It’s the other way round,” a small wry smile played around Ren’s lips. “I used to be a part of  _ it _ . Now I am alone in a room so vast I can’t see the walls or the ceiling. I reach out. There is nothing.”

Ren lifted his hand, probably to feel his new braid. Hux caught it in his own, squeezing.  _ There is me in that room _ , he thought hard. But Ren couldn’t hear him.

“Then we’ll go to Jakku,” he said instead. 

 

*

 

“General Organa!”

Poe Dameron barged into the war room the way he always did, the crowds parting like butter before his confidence and lapping up his superficially polite words of apology for interrupting. Leia Organa rolled her eyes. She was eighty-five percent sure Dameron knew what he was doing. The remaining fifteen percent was the benefit of the doubt. It was marginally possible Dameron really believed his news were always the freshest, most wanted and most useful.

The worst was, they usually were.

The officer she’d been currently talking to knew better than to stand in Dameron’s way. She dismissed him with a little nod and turned to the newcomer.

“What is it, Commander?”

“That web of operatives you wanted to have set up along the systems with interest for the First Order - I was just on my way through Western Reaches when I heard from our man on Jakku. The FO apparently attempted to blockade the planet for a while. I brought the news here straight away.”

Leia lifted her eyebrows and waited.

“All right, I flew there to have a look myself first,” Poe Dameron sighed. “How come you  _ always  _ know?”

“You’re a good pilot, a bad liar, and the worst strategist,” Leia fought to keep her mouth in a severe line. “Going alone against a blockade fleet?”

“There was hardly any fleet to speak of,” Dameron snorted. “Two light cruisers and one starfighter carrier. Though it doesn’t take much to cut off a planet with only one spaceport,” he acknowledged.

“To the point, Commander.”

“Yes. As I said. Any blockade that might have been going on there was already over when I arrived. One of the cruisers was disabled - pulled on tractor beams by the other and swarming with repair units like an ugly anthill.”

“Who could’ve attacked them?” Leia frowned and turned to the computer, calling up the latest intel of the remaining New Republic forces. “It couldn’t be anyone of ours - I forbade any action that could lead to open war. We’re not ready for that yet.”

“I don’t think it was us, ma’am,” Dameron shook his head. Pulling up his datapad and plugging it into the terminal, he’d pulled up a holo of the disabled cruiser.

“See the damage - here, and here? Long, uninterrupted, heavy fire. X-wings don’t have enough firepower to scorch a line this long. And then there’s this–” the holo image rotated, revealing a similar damage on the other side of the ship, “–starship turbolasers might have enough power but they won’t be able to maneuver so fast to hit  _ both _ sides.”

“An advanced heavy starfighter,” Leia concluded.

“And we know who uses them,” Dameron added. Leia nodded, pondering this new information. The Knights of Ren - ruthless warriors, exceptional pilots, and apparently turncoats, as of now.

“The question is what was First Order doing on Jakku.” The planet was hardly of any interest now after the murder of San Tekka and with Rey long gone. Unless…

“That’s what I was asking myself,” Dameron grinned. “So I’ve parked my craft in a convenient crater on the second moon, shut down all systems and just listened for a while.”

“And you found out that Rey has returned home,” Leia beat him to his grand revelation. It was almost comical to watch the way his face fell when she spoiled the surprise - but again, Poe should have known better than to indulge his flair for drama when delivering strategic news.

“Yes, ma’am,” he confirmed meekly. “As far as I could decipher from their transmissions she was still planetside when the orbital skirmish broke out. They were calling for reinforcements and ground forces.”

Leia was already walking towards the announcements station. “We need to extract her before they do. Thank you, Commander. This is very valuable information indeed.”

“One more thing,” Dameron jogged up behind her. “Just as I was about to leave, one more ship entered the system. Bounty hunters, from the look of it. And not very keen to let themselves be spotted by the First Order ships, or so it seemed.”

Bounty hunters. Now that was interesting. First Order would hardly waste resources setting up a private party to retrieve a person that was already in the scope of their military operation. Plus Dameron was certain that the hunters were avoiding the First Order altogether… it didn’t make sense. There wasn’t any third party in the Galaxy who’d be interested in capturing Rey. In fact, the highest bounty running in the Outer Rim systems had been announced on the defected General Hux so any bounty hunters were most likely working  _ for _ the First Order, not against them…

Her mind drifted to the lost assault team she’d sent to Arkanis. She’d severely underestimated Hux there. Sixteen men and women paid with their lives for her mistake.

Resistance agents were able to follow Hux’s trail to Kemal Station where they lost him. His stolen ship remained there but Hux was gone. Inquiries among the locals turned out that a pair of bounty hunters had also visited the trading post that day. It was universally assumed that they had got their man and that was the end of Hux.

Maybe they underestimated him once again.

But what would Hux want on Jakku? A quiet spot to disappear in? Leia couldn’t imagine a man like him willing to spend his life in exile on that isolated, worthless and desolate world.

And then there was something else. Mentions in the report from Kemal Station that Hux seemed to have an accomplice. At the time, Leia had assumed that he’d roped some loyal soldier or officer into defecting with him. But now, with the sudden inexplicable interest in Jakku… and with the way Luke had disappeared from the Force but turned up alive and hale…

Leia halted and spun on her heel, huffing slightly when Dameron nearly ran into her.

“Poe. Ready the Black Squadron. This is going to be very important.”

 

 


	20. "I hate sand."

Going to Jakku was the worst idea ever, Hux thought blearily as he rolled onto his side. The movement sent a stab of pain through the base of his skull and filled his mouth with the taste of bile. Gritty, sticky sand stuck to the back of his neck. His ankle hurt and he was sure joints weren’t supposed to bend at that angle. Sun was beating down at him with merciless glare, the heat parching his skin and drying up the trickle of blood he could feel running down the bridge of his nose.

Dark contrasting sun-shaped patch floated in front of his eyes wherever he looked. He lay facing the sky for too long. Hux lifted his arm to shield his eyes but his sight was useless and would be for some time. He’d let his hand flop back down and jolted with surprise and relief, one coming so fast after the other that he nearly inhaled a mouthful of sand. His half-numb fingers closed around something smooth and soft. Some little part of him that wasn’t busy hurting spared a little chuckle at the fact a mere month ago, he would have never imagined touching Ren for whatever reason and now he would know the texture of Ren’s hair anywhere.

“Wake up, Ren.”

Tightening his fingers into a fist was an effort worth several breaths, each coming shorter than the last. Hux tugged weakly at the strand of blood-matted hair, once, twice.

“Wake up, idiot. You can’t be sleeping now. It’s my turn.”

Hux wasn’t sure if the words were actually making it past his lips. He’d meant it as a joke - but stars, did he want to sleep. Just for a moment. This was it, wasn’t it? This was how how they met their end.

Shot down from the sky of Jakku like the Imperial behemoths of the old Empire. In time, nobody would be able to tell their remnants from those crashed thirty years ago.

Hux closed his eyes against the too bright light and slept.

 

*

 

He came to blessed, soothing darkness, and shivering cold that clung to his skin like a damp blanket. Dull pain thudding behind his eye sockets told him not to move his head too much. There was a flickering glow of orange and red to his right - and warmth - and when his eyes refocused he could finally recognise a figure huddled next to him, watching over a small pit of smoldering embers.

The roof above his head was uneven, natural rock. If Hux lifted his arm he’d be able to touch it. The ground beneath his back was earthen and the air was stuffy. How did they got from a ship into a cave?

Hux tried to sit up and hissed in pain when he shifted his foot. Now that he became aware of his limbs, he could feel the bandage wrapped around his ankle.

“Lay down. Don’t move yet.”

Ren’s hand on his shoulder, pushing down, and another cradling the back of his head. Then he held a wet cloth to Hux’s lips. Hux sucked on it, those few drops of liquid only parching him more. His tongue felt too big for his mouth as he swallowed.

“Hold on,” Ren muttered and handed him another piece of cloth. This one was wetter and Hux was able to gulp down a good mouthful of water. Ren slapped the first one onto a rocky wall behind him and used the second one to wipe Hux’s forehead and cheeks. The wall of the cave glistened with wetness. It must have been a spring there but so weak it didn’t even trickle. Even that was a blessing, considering where they were.

“Took you long enough, sleepyhead,” Ren said. He sounded angry about it. Memory crept on Hux in increments - dizzy, dreamy bits of heat, overwhelming sunlight, sand and pain.

And before that - the surface approaching too fast in the viewport, and the smell of fire in the cockpit, the high-pitched scream of emergency alarm.

 

*

 

They had been scouting out the planet from a low orbit when suddenly a fleet of Resistance ships jumped into the system. Starfighter carrier, several U-wing support crafts and a whole slew of X-wing fighters that went after the _Lightning Bolt_ like a swarm of bloodthirsty mosquitos.

They tried to find an opening for the jump but they were quickly cut off. Then they tried to get lost in the desert but the X-wings were much faster and nimbler in the atmosphere than their ship. And then they picked up a transmission - open call frequency, hailing them with the voice of the leader of the starfighter squadron.

 _“Ben, hey… I dunno if it’s really you and I’m not sure I want to believe it but she said so–”_ and the crackling voice chuckled, the noise of one of Hux’s fire bursts zinging by temporarily drowning it out. The X-wing evaded it easily.

_“Nice try. But here’s this - you can come home. I know you’re hearing this. Just drop the baggage and… the door’s still open.”_

Ren snapped out of his stupor and brought his fist down on the com speaker, smashing it in a burst of sparks. Then he looked at Hux and it was like a punch to the gut - Hux’s breath hitched at the sheer wretched dismay brewing in those wide, dark eyes.

 _Drop the baggage,_ the Resistance pilot - probably a friend of Ren, once - said. _Hand over the war criminal and come to kneel at your mother’s skirts, prodigal son._

Hux met Ren’s eyes with the coldest glare he could muster and tried to ignore the small piece of his heart clenching and shrieking in terror that Ren might want to pick up on the offer.

Then Ren gripped the helm and all hell broke loose. Up to then they were trying mostly to evade and slither their way out, outnumbered and outgunned as they were. Now Ren was tearing his path through the Resistance forces with blazing fire, dead set on bringing down as many of them as he could. Hux could hear his own laughter, the cannons like extensions of his fingers. They weren’t going to make it out but at least they could make sure they wouldn’t be taken prisoners.

Their shield gave up not long afterwards. The next hit wasn’t enough to blow them up but sent them careening into the hills below, amongst jagged rocks and pits filled with sand. The last thing Hux remembered was a huge rocky outcropping rising in the way of their fall and a quiet thought that death was going to be quick.

 

*

 

Well, considering they weren’t smashed into thousand pieces against the hillside, Ren must have succeeded in crash-landing them into one of the sand pits. The automatic ejection system probably saved their lives and was to be blamed for Hux’s pounding headache.

“Not that I’m complaining,” Hux croaked, wincing at the hoarseness of his own voice, “but how are we not on our way to war tribunal?”

Ren smiled a little at Hux’s deliberate use of plural. They were in this together, no prison for one and redemption for the other. Ren’s face was still covered with patches of dried sand and dust kept falling out of his hair when he moved.

“First Order,” he said. “The light cruisers earlier were calling for reinforcements. As it happened, the reinforcements came in time to distract the Resistance and drive them away.”

“All right - so how are we not on our way to court martial?”

Ren huffed a silent laugh and shifted back to where he sat, hunched over a portable com unit. Parts of it were laid out in the sand, and he was trying to rewire it by the light of their small fire.

“They weren’t going after us. They only wanted the girl.”

“Oh, where have I heard  _that_ before.”

“I think I liked you better when you were unconscious.”

Hux actually laughed at that, the warm surprise of it spreading through his chest and making breathing a lot easier. His laughter was however cut short when an angry hiss exploded right next to him. He jerked away and turned to come face to snout with an ysalamir.

“Hush. He doesn’t like loud noises. Also it’s probably pissed that his mate didn’t survive the crash.”

Hux sat up, slowly this time. The headache was ebbing away. The thirst remained. He helped himself to the freshly wetted cloth and sucked up some water, silently assessing their situation.

Ren had managed to save very little from the wreckage: themselves, the lone ysalamir, the com unit, the med kit. Hux still had his blaster and his blade, Ren salvaged a stun gun. If the snotty reptile wasn’t so adverse to noise Hux would have laughed - after all the time spent fighting for every step of improvement after their crash on Arkanis, they were back at the starting line.

“What about the blockade,” he asked instead. His brain worked better when it could analyze tactical information.

“They left,” Ren shook his head. “I was listening to the transmissions while you took your sweet time to wake up. They patrolled the planet for several hours, looking for the girl. Hadn’t found her. She probably escaped while the Order was distracted with the Resistance.”

So all this ordeal had been for nothing. They didn’t get any closer to the solution of the whole Force mystery. The Resistance would be coming for them and they didn’t even have a ship. It was Arkanis all over again but with sand instead of rain.

And yet Hux felt considerably better about it than he did last time. He thought back on Ren’s terrible, single-minded fury with which he declined Organa’s cheap mercy and carefully stored that memory into that little part of him that no longer felt so chillingly alone.


	21. Manual activities / Rainy afternoon

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Accidentally I (sort of) filled both prompts for today so you get double chapter length!
> 
> Also I'm not sure about the difference between M and E rating so just to be sure, the rating for this chapter is up.

Letting Ren bargain with the junkyard boss of Cratertown was another mistake in a long series of mistakes dating back to the day he hadn’t let him drown, Hux seethed quietly on the ratty bench outside the boss’ hut. The cowl Ren improvised for him was heavy and Hux could feel every drop of sweat rolling down the back of his neck, making its sticky path through the sand and grime stuck to his skin and only adding to his irritation. But Ren had been right - Hux’s face was probably featured on every holo channel all over the Galaxy by now.

Besides, as much as he loathed to admit it, the opportunity to sit down was really appreciated. Their trek from the hills to the nearest settlement had been a hell on Hux’s ankle and his pride - past certain point he had to choose which one to sacrifice first.

It didn’t help that Ren was already saddled with the uncooperative deadweight of the ysalamir. The poor beast had gone catatonic with the heat, not enough air moisture and dry nutrients. Hux wondered whether Ren believed that the lone, weakened animal would be enough against the girl when they finally found her, or if he simply refused to let it go out of sentiment. If he would _name_ it.

Squawking, cooing and flapping from the waterhole around the corner kept interrupting Hux’s thought. He glared at the flailing and squabbling flock of bloggin hens. Some of them snapped their beaks and glared back. Animals were awful, Hux decided. Well, maybe the predators at least intelligent and elegant - Hux always had a soft spot for felids - but this fowl was simply intolerable.

When Ren finally emerged out of the hut, followed by the boss, Hux found his fears were entirely unfounded.

“Gage Khel very pleased,” the Uthuthma owner of the only major business for hundreds of miles around and the unofficial boss of this settlement announced in broken Basic, flashing them a toothy grin. Although that could have been his default expression, considering the lack of fat under his skin and the far too many teeth in his maw. Around his neck, held in place by the chains decorating his collar, rested the heavily breathing ysalamir.

“Your transport,” Gage Khel waved his skeletal hand towards something Hux up to now believed was a pile of scrap metal and then disappeared back into his den. Ren was left standing there, grimly ignoring Hux’s glare.

“He wouldn’t accept republican credits,” Ren said at last. “Ysalamiri pelt though seems to be a prized article.”

“Oh. And here I feared he’d call off the deal when the pest died,” Hux vented his frustration into sarcasm. “So we’re back in the game of letting locals swindle us out of money?”

“I got us a ship,” Ren pointed out mildly. The mildness seemed to be strained, just like Hux’s well of benevolence was parched into a pitiful drop in the scorching heat.

“You got us a piece of junk.”

“It’s Anxarta-class light freighter,” Ren retorted as he started towards it.

“It’s junk-class piece of scrap iron. How come you’re familiar with every class of garbage ships in the Galaxy?”

Ren gave him a hard stare, long enough that Hux deflated a little and even began reconsidering his prickly approach. But before he could say anything awkward like an apology, the corner of Ren’s mouth quirked up in a smirk.

“I’m actually not very familiar with this one. Sienar pulled them out of the production line about ten years before I was born.”

Hux groaned. Obsolete and unfamiliar. Getting this ship airborne was going to take a while.

 

*

 

While Ren dug himself into the ship’s underbelly, Hux hobbled through the main board. The freighter was designed for a crew of two and up to six passengers, and Hux managed to scrape enough from the individual cabins to make himself comfortable in the best one. He didn’t know how many years this ship collected dust on the junkyard but apparently enough time for most of its rig to get scavenged away. Their only luck was that the local Uthuthma population didn’t seem too keen on tech because they hadn’t started disassembling the ship for parts.

“The main problem with the hyperdrive is the boosters,” Ren coughed up, his head emerging from the panel in the middle of the floor. “It’s there to facilitate… eh, never mind. Hand me the hydrospanner.”

“I know what boosters are for,” Hux said stiffly. “I engineered the propelling system for the Starkiller Base in case you forgot. Get yourself your fucking hydrospanner, flyboy.”

Ren blinked the dust out of his eyes and rested his elbows on the panel edge for a moment, rubbing his chin and staring at Hux absentmindedly as if he was some indecipherable specimen.

“I know you did,” he said at last. “You’re the designer of new, inspired and unparalleled. But this isn’t engineering, this is just repairing a cranky old piece of garbage that we need to get up and going before the Resistance finds us so would you _please_ help me?”

The way Ren enunciated every letter of the word please as if he was doing Hux a favor made Hux want to smash the hydrospanner against his head but in the end he put it into Ren’s waiting palm, accepting the grunt of thanks with begrudging silence. Ren was right. Not everything needed to be Hux’s forte. Not everything had to be firmly in his hands.

Rooting in the cargo bays revealed at least one positive aspect of their new transport. According to the ship logs, one of the previous captains was a Gilliand, frequently desperate to feel water on her skin when space travel took her away from her natural habitat for too long. She’d turned one of the stalls into her personal relaxation booth, equipped with water filter and recycling unit. Hux dug around for a little longer until he found hosepipes long enough to connect the fuel pump with the waterhole next to the junkyard, and the sight of the reservoir water level slowly going up was enough to make up for the indignity of being pecked at by the angry bloggin for trespassing on their territory.

 

*

 

Hux didn’t imagine the subtle _phew_ Ren let out when the star points around them turned into lines and the blurred as they jumped into hyperspace.

“You weren’t sure it would work,” he observed smugly.

“I was reasonably sure about the boosters,” Ren objected. “The flux capacitor connectors, on the other hand...”

“You choose the moment after we’d already entered the hyperspace to tell me we can drop out of it any given time?”

“It should keep,” Ren muttered. “For now.”

The nearest system where they could get new parts without triggering another swarm of people interested in collecting the bounty was three days away. Hux gave up.

“I’m going to take a shower while the power is still on,” he announced.

 

*

 

He wasn't enjoying the bliss of hot water washing away the sludge from his skin for whole five minutes when the booth partition squeaked open. He cursed when the chilly air hit his heated skin and then yelped when the cold was immediately replaced by the heat of another body plastering itself along his back.

“Get out. You're making me dirty again.”

“Ask nicely and I'll make you dirty allright,” Ren mouthed into the skin on Hux's nape.

 

 

Hux growled in irritation as Ren’s nudged him out of the spray and flush against the cold metal wall. The drain under their feet swirled with new dredges of grime and sand, the water gurgling through the filter to come out clean again out of the sprinkles above their heads. Ren scrubbed himself perfunctorily before wrapping his arms around Hux’s waist and pulling him back into the warmth, flush against his hot skin.

“Better?”

“Tolerable,” Hux amended. It _was_ nice to lean against Ren’s solid chest and ease some weight off his aching ankle while Ren’s big hands worked at his scalp, and then his shoulders, massaging away the sore knots until Hux all but purred. The tenseness gradually left his body, leaving a completely different kind of tension in its wake.

“See?” Ren murmured, sliding his hands down Hux’s sides and thighs and back up, every pass a teasing bit closer to his groin. “All clean. So pretty.”

Hux snorted and spluttered when he accidentally inhaled some of the water spray. “I’m not pretty.”

“You are,” Ren nosed along the line of his shoulders, every now and then scraping with his teeth, not to the point of pain, just this side of thrilling. “It almost makes up for your awful personality.”

More water got into Hux’s mouth as he laughed. “What a shame there’s nothing to make up for yours,” he chided.

Ren’s hands tightened briefly around his waist - his fingers spanning him in wide almost-circle. Hux wondered if Ren’s fingertips would touch if he sucked in his stomach hard enough. He’d gotten thinner in the past weeks.

“You talk too much.” Ren’s lips brushed the shell of Hux’s ear and then he bit down, harder this time, sucking the lobe into his mouth and rolling it between his teeth. Hux suppressed a shiver and tilted his head, the tendons on his neck standing out. Ren wasted no time attacking it, nibbling and licking along the taut line as Hux closed his eyes, water beating against his face and silencing any retort he could have come up with.

Then Ren shifted behind him, hooking his chin over Hux’s shoulder to nuzzle against the coarse hair along Hux’s jawline. Fingers trailed down Hux’s back, following the dip of his spine and slipping into his crack, rubbing across sensitive skin and Hux arched his back without thinking–

–and the shift shot up sharp twinge of pain from his injured ankle, and Hux remembered how thick Ren’s length felt in his hand, and how long it’s been since–

“Relax,” Ren murmured, one fingertip rubbing back and forth, the calloused edges catching on the rim of Hux’s tightly clenched hole but not pushing inwards. Not yet. His other hand rested over Hux’s hipbone, the soothing caress unbearably sweet. Hux almost wanted it to hurt, wanted something to fight against.

“You–” a kiss on the nape of his neck, “think–” another between his shoulderblades, “too–” another, with a hint of teeth, right over the dip above his buttocks, “much,” and Ren’s thumbs, _right there,_ pulling his asscheeks apart and then his mouth and _fuck_ , his tongue.

Hux fell forward, bracing his hands against the wall and sticking his ass out. He felt open and terribly exposed, shamelessly riding Ren’s face, letting him do his worst. And Ren did - oh how he did. Lapping and licking and probing, the scruff on his chin scratching across sensitive skin and sending sparks of pleasure up Hux’s spine. Ren sucked at his hole and pushed his pointed tongue past the rim and Hux shook and squirmed under the onslaught, held in place by Ren’s hands gripping his ass and sheer determination to come like that, on Ren’s tongue. Hux didn’t know if he could but stars, he wanted to try.

And then Ren kriffing _cheated_ slipping two spit-slicked fingers into Hux’s ass, the sting of it slamming Hux back into his body and making him hyper aware of Ren’s tongue still licking around the stretched rim, every pass of it burning its path straight to Hux’s cock. Ren crooked his fingers and pressed down and Hux’s vision went white as he came, seed splattering against the shower wall.  

Hux was never so glad for someone groping his ass because right now it was the only thing holding him up. Ren’s huge palms cupped his cheeks and long fingers were splayed across his hips. Hux rested his face against the cool metal wall and was still catching his breath when Ren stood up behind him. He could feel Ren’s cock, rigid and hot, brushing against the back of his thighs.

“You could fuck me,” he dared. His hole was barely open but it wouldn’t be the first time he’d taken that–

“Some other time.” Ren sounded about as wrecked as Hux felt. “You’re so tight you could grind diamonds up your ass. Arch your back.”

Hux obeyed despite his muscles feeling like jelly, even as he complained, “I’m not letting you up my ass if you keep insulting it.”

“We’ll see,” Ren huffed and squeezed Hux’s cheeks together, pushing his cock into the crack and fucking Hux’s ass with short, frantic snaps of his hips until he groaned and came, hot and sticky all over the small of Hux’s back.

“Filthy,” Hux mumbled. Ren rested his forehead briefly on Hux’s nape and then straightened, pulling Hux along to lean back against his chest and again taking most of Hux’s weight.

“Told you I’d make you,” Ren sounded smug about it, and also a bit like… happy. Hux couldn’t know for sure because he’s closed his eyes against the water and didn’t want to open them anytime soon.

“I shouldn’t have snapped at you earlier,” Hux said later, half-drowsy, resting in the comfortable cradle of Ren’s arms and letting the water wash away every last bit of sand from his body and his mind, too. He could feel Ren’s exhales, soft and steady, tickling the wet skin just under his hairline.

“It’s fine,” Ren yawned. “You were just your usual charming self. I’m used to it.”

“I wasn’t, that’s the point,” Hux groused. “I’m… not used to be the dependent one.”

Ren hummed. His fingers kept idly stroking down Hux’s arms and up his torso, ghosting over his prominent ribs, tracing Hux’s flat pectorals, trailing along the thin muscle in Hux’s arms. Hux tried to curl on himself. For fuck’s sake, he’d let Ren eat out his ass and yet he felt more exposed, raw and vulnerable and _seen_ like this, under Ren’s curious fingers mapping his body. Thin and useless.

“I couldn’t - I can’t do this without you, Hux,” Ren said at last. His breathing was quiet, voice low, arms around Hux a tight, safe circle. “If you weren’t with me, in that fight… I would’ve guided the _Lightning Bolt_ straight into the rock wall.”

Hux blinked his eyes open. He should be saying something but he couldn’t find the words.

“I can’t ever go back,” Ren continued quietly. “But you… you make me want to keep going forward.”  

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Art for this chapter by the incomparable [@creepycreepyspacewizard,](https://creepycreepyspacewizard.tumblr.com/) whose light study series continue to steal my breath away.


	22. When one doesn't know how to read a map...

Leia Organa stood on the observation deck of the bridge and watched the Black Squadron docking on the carrier. A few of them had not returned and each empty place in the formation twisted the knife in her heart a little deeper.

She was so very tired. Tired of hopping from one system to another, from Yavin to Hoth to Dantooine to D’Qar, and now again - never staying long enough for a place to start feel like home. Knowing deep inside that no matter how lush and verdant world they’d find, the constellations above it would never be the same as those over Alderaan.

All her life she’d dedicated her every thought, every action to hope. For freedom, for a better Galaxy. For a while, she thought she’d made it. The Empire fell, the New Republic rose. But the evil remained, lurking just around the edges of their little bubble of hope, and Leia watched the Republic grow complacent in her victory, becoming weak, incompetent and fragile. Lately, she began to wonder if she would live to see her hope fulfilled. If there would be anyone to carry on with her legacy. She’d failed on that account, too.

Ben wasn’t coming back. She should just give up on trying to get him to. It had already cost her Han... What hope was there to be held out for someone who might not even exist anymore? 

Her datapad beeped with a message. Looking at the header, she felt a fresh flutter of hope stirring inside her. Maybe that was her connection to the Force: an unextinguishable spark keeping her reaching for an unattainable goal. Now she was being called to the medbay.

 

*

 

“General, ma’am. He barely woke after weeks in coma–”

“And you barely returned from an important mission and instead of debriefing I find you’ve run to medbay despite not having a scratch.”

Poe’s usual vivid gesticulation was restrained by the fact he was holding onto Finn’s hand as if the idea of letting go even for a second was unfathomable.

“He can answer all your questions when–”

“I’m fine, Poe,” Finn croaked and shivered. The med capsule was a claustrophobic nightmare to wake in but at least it was warm there. Immediately, Poe wrestled his own jacket off himself and wrapped it around Finn’s shoulders.

“There. This always suited you best.”

“Sorry I ruined the first one,” Finn grinned weakly.

Leia suppressed a sigh. “If you're quite done, Commander, I need to speak with Finn.”

“But–”

“Yes, ma’am,” they both answered simultaneously. Finn squeezed Poe’s hand. “I’ll be fine.”

“I want your full mission report in an hour,” Leia smiled and patted Dameron’s shoulder before shoving him unceremoniously out of the room. Then she turned to Finn.

“As much as I am sorry for interrupting your recovery, we need your help in finding Rey.”

 

*

 

Finn’s bright, wide eyes turned dark with sadness by the time Luke and Leia finished the recounting of what happened since the fall of Starkiller.

“But why? She seemed–” _normal_ , that must have been the word Finn swallowed back from the tip of his tongue. There was nothing normal about Rey. She had an innate understanding of how machinery worked, she was able to expertly fly a ship she’d never flown before, she picked up on languages from all over the Galaxy. She was gifted, exceptional.

The Force was strong with her. Finn was only beginning to learn what that meant.

“Her powers are growing exponentially,” Luke said. “What had taken years to awaken in her now takes mere minutes to destroy her opponents, draining them of all their Force abilities and accumulate the power in herself.”

“She’s… she’s not evil!” Finn protested. “She wouldn’t have helped me - she wouldn’t have been drawn to your lightsaber if she was.” He pointed a finger at Luke Skywalker. Leia saw the twitch of her brother’s whiskers and hid a small smile herself.

“I believe the first time she wasn’t even aware of what happened. The second time, it frightened her - she panicked. She wasn’t doing it on purpose, had no control over it. But she’s learning,” Luke warned.

“But even if she became the most powerful Force user alive, she cannot stand against First Order alone. We need to find her before Snoke does,” Leia added.

Finn probably imagined what would Supreme Leader of the First Order do if he managed to leash such abundance of power because he shuddered.

“But what help do you expect from me? The location of Snoke’s citadel was known only to the High Command. I know you believe I have those powers too but I never… I don’t know if I can.”

Leia cut back on the commanding tone that came to her as a second nature and gentled her voice. “You’re the only one who can, Finn.”

This was difficult for her: Luke was always the more patient one. But Finn had only met Luke today and she didn’t expect the former Stormtrooper to give away his trust so easily.

“I will aid you, but you’re the one she considered a friend. She saved your life. Close your eyes, think of her and listen to your heart.”

Finn nodded. He doubted the whole feasibility of this plan but he would give it his best.

He thought of Rey - her radiant smile, eyes soft with compassion and hard with disappointment when he told her he was running away. The way she looked at him when he came back for her, how natural the hug felt, a piece of his soul he’d been missing his whole life. The Force tying them together in an instant connection. And then he realized he _could_ feel her - first as a weak tug at a loose string in his mind. When he followed the direction, her presence solidified and grew, from a hazy wisp into a heavy mass of storm clouds, threatening to roll over his mind–

_fear, pain, loneliness, betrayal, anger, despair, too much, too much, too–_

_Focus. Don’t let it consume you. Stay away, just look._

A touch to his hand, distant as a dream. Soft hand on his, warm, dry and rough like old parchment, tingling with energy. It soothed him, like his head falling into the pillows after a long hard day. He tried to send some of that calming feeling through the stream of consciousness connecting him to Rey but her turmoil was too strong, the flow from her like dark waters in a flooded river, crushing everything in its path.

Finn found he could look. He saw fragments of memories floating in the troubled waters, images of worlds teetering in the reflection of lightning on the dark surface. A knowledge that wasn’t his own supplied their names. Spirana. Allanteen Six. Thaere. Mon Gazza. Christophsis. Ryloth.

Finn realized he’d been muttering the names aloud when Leia shook him by the shoulder, waking him from this strange not-dream.

“She’s following the Corellian Run into the outer reaches of Wild Space.” It took him a while to gather the words after thinking so intensely in images and emotions.

Luke and Leia looked at each other, frowning.

“It could be,” Leia said slowly. “We’ve had a few reports from Shimia that indicated unrest. There’s more Pacithip settlers coming to live off-world as of late, now when I think of it. We thought it was the pirates of Wrea but it could have been First Order, setting up new routes.”

“You should send the fleet directly to Wrea,” Luke suggested. “That way we can scare off the pirates that could run into her by accident and when she arrives, we’ll be waiting for her.”

“I’m not likely to come up with anything better so it’s a plan,” Leia sighed. “The evacuation of D’Qar is almost complete. What’s Wrea like?”

“Beats Hoth, definitely,” Luke grinned.

 

 


	23. Tentacles, seashells and shellfish

“It's oddly quiet.” Hux surveyed the data compiled from his latest search. “You would've thought the Resistance would be keener on redeeming you or whatever it was they wanted you for.”

“ _You_ would've thought that.” Ren was crouched at the back wiring panels, tinkering with the circuits and trying to reroute more power to the hyperdrive stabilizers. At Hux’s offhand remark he looked up, eyebrows drawn into his usual angry sneer. Only that now Hux could see how thin the anger was, and how deep ran the blank resignation hidden beneath it.

“Organa doesn't want me when she can have the girl. Everyone is just a weapon to her, one that she utilizes or discards as she sees fit.”

“It would seem your mother would see eye to eye with my father,” Hux couldn’t help but chuckle. “Was that why you'd run off to Snoke?”

Ren sighed.

“Snoke was...the first to truly see me, in a way. He understood - my... Organa never did, never tried. She never made the effort to use or even understand the Force. Skywalker knew more but he only wanted the Light. I was meant to cut off a part of me when I didn't even know where that part began and ended. Skywalker was a Jedi and wanted the Jedi to return. As if they could solve anything. The Jedi preached Light and sowed Dark, enforcing oppression, tolerating corruption, ignoring slavery-”

Hux stared, his chest growing painfully tight. He’d always thought Ren’s relationship to Snoke was that of an apprentice and a master, obedience and blind faith and even fear. That constant competition for Supreme Leader’s approval - Hux had thought that for Ren, it was to rise in Snoke’s favour, to secure himself more power. Just like it was for Hux. He’d never thought Ren might have wanted simply… make Snoke proud.

And yet he wasn’t running back to him. Ren must have known that even Snoke, in the end, was only interested in his powers. That betrayal must have stung twice as badly.

Uncomfortable with the turn his thoughts have taken, Hux backpedaled and quickly found a diversion.

“Where have you been when I was composing my speech? I spent days on every word! If I knew a skilled orator was hiding under that bucket all the time-”

His put-upon outrage was cut short when Ren abruptly stood and crossed the distance between them in two strides, gripping Hux’s chin and tipping his head back to look down on his face. Hux stared up, challenging, and sure enough - Ren’s severe scowl broke into a grin, and his fingers stroked through the scruff along Hux’s jaw almost affectionately.

“You’re such an asshole,” Ren said, amused wonder in his voice, and then he kissed Hux, hard and quick.

“Tell me something I don’t know,” Hux licked his lips when Ren released them. He liked the way Ren’s eyes followed the movement, pupils growing wide.

But then his gaze flicked over to the data screen Hux has been analyzing and his grin turned from playful to smugly victorious.

“The Resistance is moving the fleet to the Gaulus sector,” he pointed a triumphant finger at the screen.

The charged spell broken, Hux immediately zeroed on the data. “How do you know?” he demanded.

“The black market price of tibanna along the Smugglers’ Run just skyrocketed,” Ren highlighted the numbers. “That means a lot of ships getting ready for a lot of fighting.”

Ren was so pleased with himself that it took a while for the implications of his discovery to sink in. Hux saw the exact moment they did: Ren's breath hitched and eyes went wide, all playfulness forgotten.

“It’s the direct opening to Snoke’s system.”

It didn't make sense. The Resistance only scored one victory - and even in that battle, their losses were devastating while First Order lost the Starkiller base - a colossal weapon but ultimately just one of the many in the Order’s arsenal. The Finalizer, the rest of the Fleet - Resistance forces were no match against that. Without the New Republic support even more so. It was like waving wooden sticks at a citadel.

“It’s her.” Ren’s finger traced the familiar route between the stars, each more obscure than the last, through regions that to this day remained mostly uncharted. “He's calling to her, and Organa wants to stop her before she gets there.”

Hux didn’t need to have it spelled out to him who ‘she' was.

“Organa will fail,” Ren said grimly. “She won't be able to stop her any more than when she tried to stop me. When Snoke calls, the Force listens.”

“I think we should listen, too,” Hux said slowly. He stopped the protest rising to Ren's lips with a finger against them. “She could destroy Snoke. Or they obliterate the Resistance together. Either way, we might profit on the outcome.”

Ren caught Hux’s finger between his lips and planted a soft kiss to the tip of it before he released it, nodded, and sat himself in front of the navigation computer, pulling up the calculation program. No more questions asked, no doubts about Hux’s plan. A thrill ran through Hux’s veins, such as he hadn't felt since he last stood on the bridge of the Finalizer. They weren't on the run anymore.

 

*

 

Unfortunately, Hux had forgotten that in the game for power, there were many more players than just the First Order, the Resistance and the lone Force anomaly.

 

*

 

The world came back to Hux slowly but persistently, the sensations muted and thoughts hazy. Pins and needles in his bound hands, throbbing headache hammering at the back of his eyes, and sickly sweet taste in his mouth - an aftertaste of inhaling the incapacitant. Cool metal beneath his knees, a distant hum of badly tuned engines: a prison cell on a larger ship.

Regular, soft wheezy sound next to him. Another person breathing. Hux chanced a peek. Ren lay curled on the dirty metal floor next to him, knees drawn up and the tangled mess of his hair falling over his face. Still out of it, then.

One of the flux capacitor connectors burst, dumping them out of hyperspace and onto the orbit of Lamaredd. It was a backwater world of no interest to anyone save for fish and seafood exporters. And, apparently, pirates.

Their dilapidated freighter stood no chance against the thugs. They were boarded and a knockout gas grenade put them out of the fight before it could properly break out.

Hux had no idea why they were taken captive but judging by the heavy stomping coming down the corridor, he was about to find out.

The door slid up to let in a burly man with greying hair, more weapons in open carry than was healthy for one person and twirling a stun baton casually between his fingers. Two others filed in behind him: another wall of muscle and a smaller human woman armed with a shock stick. Out of the three, she was the one Hux was determined to keep an eye on.

The first one opened the debate with a spat on the floor in front of Hux.

“That wreck of yours isn’t worth a rathtar’s shit.”

“Pirates can’t be choosers.” Hux’s sarcasm earned him a kick in the ribs. Ren started, the movement hindered by the restraints.

“Up, sleeping beauty,” the woman nudged Ren with the end of her staff. Hux held his breath - it wasn’t charged. The shock generated by these weapons could stop a man’s heart in five seconds. Ren glared at her through his hair, keeping his head low.

“We’re wasting oxygen with them, Kir,” the big one said.

The one addressed as Kir leaned down and grabbed Hux by the hair, yanking his head up. “Dunno, Strunk - redheads are a rarity. This one could fetch a good price on the Hutt market after he cleans up a bit.”

Hux gasped - hopefully loud enough to drown out Ren’s angry hiss. Of all the moments to get stupidly protective…

“Ooh, that’s an idea. Pity this one’s damaged goods,” Strunk crouched down to give Ren similar inspection. “Half the price for a split face.”

“Says the one who wouldn’t get a credit for his whole trap,” Ren spat through clenched teeth. Hux tensed when he saw the huge fist about to connect with Ren’s nose - but then the leader caught Strunk’s sleeve.

“Wait a minute.”

“What the fuck, Kir?”

The leader jammed his stun baton under Ren’s chin, tilting his head back, face into the full light.

“I once a broke a nose just like this,” Kir grinned, showing several teeth missing as the evidence of regular fist-fights. “On Corellia.”

It could be a trick of the light but Hux was almost sure Ren turned a shade paler.

“You’re Han Solo’s brat, aren’t you?”

Hux clenched his teeth so hard he could hear his molars grind. The woman’s eyes flicked over to him and fixed back on Ren.

“You’ve got the wrong man,” Ren drawled. “My old man knew better than to make business in the Core.”

“Come on, Kir, it’s been years since you’ve been there yourself,” Strunk grumbled. “This pup couldn't be more than a toddler then.”

“Yeah, he was,” Kir laughed. “Little Benny, wasn’t it?”

Ren rolled his eyes. “I’m not him. You’re wasting your time.”

“Even if he was, what of it?” the woman pointed out. “Han Solo is dead, haven’t you heard? There’d be no ransom.”

The leader released Ren’s head from the painful looking position and walked around them, checking their cuffs.

“That’s where you’re wrong, Devi. But you’re too young and green to know the who’s who. If this is little Benny, then we can get Organa and her herd out of Wrea _and_ some cash on top of it, too.”

“And is he’s not who you think he is, Organa will shoot us down from the orbit. I’m not taking the risk, Kir. Lamaredd isn’t Wrea but it’s not so bad.”

“Wrea was ours since the Clone Wars!” Kir growled. “But you’re right. We’ll have to make sure we have the right man.” His grin widened in a way that made Hux’s skin crawl over with goosebumps.

“Ugh, I hate cleaning the slime,” Strunk groaned.

Slime? What kind of torture involved slime?

“Roll in the box,” the leader ordered and Strunk obediently dragged himself out of the room.

“I believe a little introduction is in order,” Kir turned to Ren. “Me wasn't always a pirate, you know. Back in the day, they called us partisans. Well, Saw always told us there was a difference but in the end it boils down to the same. You fight, you steal, you survive.”

The door slid up again to reveal a container, large enough to hold something far bigger than a set of interrogation tools. Bigger than a man. Strunk pushed it inside the cell and went to stand by one wall. There was a smaller door and a transparisteel partition that Hux hadn’t noticed up to now.

“Good old Saw Gerrera. Went up in flames I heard. But showed us a few tricks before he did. For example, how to get the truth out of someone who doesn’t want to talk. This little fellow,” Kir motioned to the box. Water was seeping through the cracks between the sides and the bottom, dripping on the floor.

“He doesn’t like lies. He peeks into your mind, and if you lie, he rips it apart. Well, he might do that even if you speak the truth, occupational hazard,” Kir chuckled and looked at Devi. “Take Red next door.”

“Nope, Kir,” she shook her head. “Say you’re right and this one is Organa’s son. You’ve heard the rumours? Vader, Skywalker, all that Jedi mumbo-jumbo? If it’s true, he’ll use some mind trick and Bor Gullet won’t get anything.”

Ren snorted out a laugh. “Come on, do I look like a kriffing Jedi?”

Kir scratched his head. “So what? We can do it the old fashioned way–”

“Not at all,” Devi smiled, sudden and cruel. Hux cursed under his breath. He was right to be wary of her - she was the only one among them with brains.

“I’m just saying we take Splitface next door, and leave Red here.”

Ren lunged for her - but he was bound, and she was fast and prepared. He ended up on the floor, gasping for breath as an electric shock seized every single muscle in his body.

“See?” she laughed. “They’re obviously fucking. Tell me,” she smirked down on Hux, laughing again when she noticed his futile struggle against the restraints. “Do you scream his name at night? Then telling us shouldn't be so hard in the end.”

Ren was dragged through the small door, struggling every inch of the way but bound and stunned as he was, Kir and Strunk had no trouble with him. Devi undid the safety latch on the top of the container and darted away, the door sliding shut behind her. Soon, Hux could see their faces through the transparisteel window.

The container cracked open and Hux watched, blood pounding louder and louder in his ears. A thin tentacle slipped out, feeling the floor around the box.

And then the crack widened and a mass of tentacles spilled out, gray and slimy, massive and writhing, and it began moving towards Hux.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Devi and Strunk are canonical characters from the novel Before the Awakening. They were scavengers on Jakku who escaped from there. I figured they could get far.
> 
> Saw Gerrera maintained a partisan garrison on Wrea during Clone Wars.


	24. It always rains during picnics.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Amazing illustration for this chapter drawn by rumsama :) Thanks ever so much!

_ Kylo! _

For a while, the word was all there was in his brain, keeping the void at bay. Then it got picked apart like bones of some small animal and then there was nothing.

Though the void was kind. He didn’t know why he was fearing it so much. After all the pain, and struggle, and despair - the void was such a relief.

After a while, he couldn’t remember what was before it. It was like a secret door that vanishes right after you walk through them, the wall behind your back solid and eternal. The door was never there.

Everything remained on the other side of the wall and he wasn’t sure if he should regret it.

“Hux.”

The void had a voice; interesting. He could be the one creating it, though. Who else would it be? He was alone.

“Hux!”

It couldn’t be him. He wouldn’t fixate on such repetitive sound. Although now when he focused, he could recognise different tones of that one sound. Soft and soothing. Shaking and concerned. Loud and miserable.

He didn’t know why the voice should be any of these things but he liked the soothing one.

The voice stopped talking. Pity. He already missed it. The void seemed incomplete now when he knew there was more to it.

More sounds, more sensations: pressure all around him, and a rhythmic, rocking motion. Loud fast paced noise with an echo tackled to the end of each thud. Then a brief sensation of weightlessness and then something cool under his back. The word brought on a revelation. He had a body. And it wasn’t moving on his own will. Some other body was touching his, moving him. There was someone else in the void with him.

Now that he concentrated, there was so much more. Blinking lights in his vision, and something soft and comfortingly smelling wrapped around him. The voice coming and going, short bursts of frustration and long soothing murmur of words. They had no meaning but he felt as if they should have. The lights - he was almost sure there should be memory of them, somewhere, that he used to know them, their names, what they were for. But none of it mattered as long as there was the one voice he wanted to hear.

He didn’t like it when the voice sounded as if coming from a distance, being somewhere else. Talking to someone else.

“You’ll tell me how to help him.”

“I don’t know! I swear–”

“Don’t you? Should I make sure? Should I cut off your other arm and throw you back there? The creature could do with some fresh fear for a snack!”

“No! Please! I don’t know - we never had anyone who hadn’t tried to lie - please don’t! Please–”

He didn’t like this, his voice wasting time with someone else. So he tried a sound of his own. How hard could it be? The others certainly knew how to make an awful lot of noise.

“Hux?”

Two man-shaped blurs appeared in his line of vision. He briefly giggled, it was funny how they moved in unison. Then something - perhaps a muscle memory - told him how to focus his eyes, and the two blurs coalesced into the shape of a single man.

The man was holding his face in both hands, repeating ‘Hux’ over and over. His lines felt so familiar - broad, ragged, strong. Something wet glistened on his wrists. Deep gashes, still oozing blood. That must have hurt. Something new floated up from the void. A scrap of memory. Maybe a dream. Gentle lips on a bruised skin.

“Must kiss it better,” he tried to wrap his mouth around the shape of the words from his dreams. He still didn’t know what they meant but they felt comforting. He took the hands in his own and planted a little nuzzling kiss to each wound. There. It shouldn’t hurt so much now.

He was confused when he looked up to find tears rolling down the man’s cheeks. What reason was there to cry? They were together. He didn’t know why but if there was one thing he was sure of, one thing more real than the void, it was the fact that they belonged together.

Time passed with more beeping, mechanical sounds, and new shapes that sometimes blinked into existence with a name. Viewport. Coat. Caf. Jogan fruit cake. He giggled some more when he recognized this one because by now he could understand how ridiculous it was, to know the name of a cake and not the names of hundreds of other things. There must have been more, more names, more meanings, perhaps even a time when he ate this cake, a past, a life. He felt as if he was treading on a thin ice over a giant lake, the things he’d been missing, all hiding just a touch below. But the darkness beneath the ice was frightful, the depth unknown. Better not go looking for the cracks.

Big arms around him, a hand pointing out bright spots of light above their heads, whispering names, strange assortments of letters. Some had no meaning, some stirred something within his mind, feeling of  _ ought to know, almost knew _ , the ice growing thinner and scarier… But the steady murmur of it was lulling him to sleep and so he didn’t fight it, letting the sparks of recollection light up and fade as they went.

“... and somewhere up there’s Chandrila, you wouldn’t like it either. Small and boring. Spent there one summer, worst family holiday ever. Somehow it always rained during picnics...”

“It always rained on Arkanis, too,” he mumbled sleepily and almost didn’t realize what happened until he heard the gasp, the gust of it ruffling his hair, and then hands grasping his shoulders, almost too tight at first and then immediately letting go, touching him softly, cautiously, as if he could shatter with a word.

“Hux…?” A breath, and the ice beneath his feet broke.  

_ Horror, a tangle of tentacles moving towards him with wet slurping sounds, crawling up his body, around his neck, slipping into his ears– _

“Hux! It’s all right. You’re safe. It’s gone. I killed them. You’re safe now.”

_ They asked Ren’s name, and he didn’t want to tell them, he didn’t, but the creature was squeezing his brain, penetrating every thought, scorching its path along Hux’s synapses with its presence, and he couldn’t hide, nothing could hide– _

“You’re safe. You’re back. Please stay with me. Please...”

Hux clung to Ren’s arms until he stopped shaking. The world was slowly coming back into focus, this time in its dazzling, terrifying wholeness.

“What did I tell them?”

Ren slowly turned him around in his arms, wide, red-rimmed eyes staring at Hux in wonder.

“You told them my name.”

“Oh.” That was shameful. But it explained why he was still alive. He couldn’t have lied if he tried. “I am sorry.”

“You told them my  _ real _ name.” Ren’s eyes burned bright. “The one  _ you _ associated with me.”

Hux blinked twice.  _ I’m not calling you Kylo _ , his own words from ages ago came haunting him. Oh.  _ Oh.  _ Briefly, he wondered how long Kylo had seen what Hux had been deliberately blind to.

Then he remembered the wounds on Kylo’s wrists and he grabbed his hands to inspect them. Deep uneven gouges, the flesh around them chafed and torn where the restraints cut into the skin. Already covered in bacta patches and wrapped, though shoddily. Hux rewrapped the bandages, a neat job that helped to rearrange his mind. Kylo didn’t twitch even though it must have still hurt, his face so soft and full of emotion Hux didn’t dare to steal more than a few glimpses.

“I broke out while they were busy being disappointed,” Kylo said. Now that Hux knew what to look for, he spotted the scorched patch on the tunic covering Kylo’s left hip. He must have got hit with the electrostaff at least once.

“I saved the woman for the last,” he said darkly.

Hux hummed. He almost wished he’d been there to watch. Then he took his first good look around. They sat on the floor, Kylo's coat with its familiar smell pooled around them where it fell from Hux's shoulders. A puddle of spilled caf, crumbles of jogan fruit cake - remnants of an improptu picnic in the cockpit of some larger ship - a medium freighter, at least. He could see the controls of at least two turret-mounted laser cannons. Good.

“Let’s call her _ Audacity _ ,” he said. “Because we are going to need a lot of that.”

“Do we?”

“This–” Hux winced, “this  _ accident _ . There’ll always be some pirates, or bounty hunters, or stray Rebels, or a lucky First Order patrol ship. Hopping from ship to ship, going from desolate to acceptable and back again. This is not the life I want for us. We need to take action. Are you with me?”

Kylo kissed him, slow and sure. Not just agreement. An oath.

“I’m with you, Hux. To the end.”


	25. Fairground

Snoke sat it the grand hall of the Citadel, surrounded by memories. Not all of them were his own. Some had been brought to him, as offerings, a part of the rite of passage, or like dead mice laid out on the porch by a cat fishing for approval. Lightsabers - some still shiny and unscratched, some worn down and so old their kyber hearts still refused to bend to the will other than their Master’s. Some that had seen the heat of many battles and some that still remembered only the warmth of a small hand, their first crafter, before the warmth seeped out and the hand went limp with death. He collected them all. Their Force presence enhanced his focus.

Since the Awakening, much has changed on the landscape of the Force that to a trained mind felt like an undercurrent in a deceptively quiet pond. The fabric of life-bound energy used to be more or less evenly distributed, with the few wellsprings and nodes mapped out and kept in check. The Knights, zealots for a cause he’d given them, easily manipulated. He’d bred enough infight between them to ever pose any danger to him, even now when they disowned him. The last remaining Lightsiders, one beaten and bitter and another secretly hating the Force, hating it for everything it cost her and refusing to use her powers. He couldn’t pinpoint their physical location but he could always feel them in the Force. And then - his own apprentice, a true heir to the power of the old Masters, his alignment teetering on the edge between Light and Dark. A promising apprentice who failed in the end, like so many before him.

For several years, the rest of the Force was in slumber, the sensitivity in sentient beings dormant. Quiet. Perhaps the peace was a lie, like the seemingly serene surface of water in a boiling pot that is missing the one nucleus for the boil to explode, the one nudge over the edge of a substantial change. So Snoke waited, and he had been patient.

But even all his years of wisdom hadn’t prepared him for what would happen when the pot finally boiled over.

The precarious balance was gone. The once orderly pattern of Force throughout the Galaxy now looked as if a savage tear was ripped through the metaphorical fabric, with the warp bunched up around the dislocation and with gaping holes left in its wake. And at the center of it, not a wellspring, but a sinkhole - absorbing Light and Dark alike, and every feeding only leaving her more hungry.

He’d met beings that defied classification before. Beings without alignment, living out their years on small worlds under amber sunlight, surrounded by skittering animals and ghosts of dead friends. Force spirits bound to the tombs encasing bones long turned to dust, with voices as malicious as powerless. But this one was new. New and unpredictable attraction on the stagnant fairground of Force tricks. He could not foresee her end.

Maybe she was the end.

 

*

 

“All ships, stand at the ready,” Leia Organa blurted out the command out of the blue, after several hours of uneventful patrol at the orbit of Wrea. At the same moment, Finn drew in a shaky breath, twisting to stare into the empty space behind him as if he was touched by a ghost.

“She’s near.”

“I know.”

“A scout ship has just jumped into the system,” the tactical station reported. “Identification: it’s the _Wayward,_  ma’am.”

“Good speed for a thirty year old ship,” Leia muttered to Luke. Her brother just shrugged. It was a good starship in the last years of the war even though she needed a patch or two. He didn’t want to put an undue strain on Resistance’s fledgling fleet when he prepared his exile, so he took his old _Wayward._ Rey had probably found a way to enhance the speed and engine power - she had a way with machinery that evaded even Luke.

Leia opened the com channel.

“Rey. I’m so glad we found you. Please listen to us. We’re here to help you.”

The _Wayward_ slowed down. Her engines didn’t indicate it was about to jump again. Leia took it as a good sign. And yet it took what felt like an eternity for the holo projector to flicker to life, showing them a shaky, digital-processed image of Rey.

Finn’s first impulse was to check the projector settings. He cursed softly, eyes widening when he realized what Leia herself found hard to believe: Rey’s visage, her very physical form had changed.

She seemed taller, folded in half in the pilot’s seat, long arms easily reaching over to the most remote controls. What she’d gained in height seemed to be taken from her bulk because her face and neck were almost unnaturally thin, sharp cheekbones and bony jaw line casting deep shadows over the prominent hollow at the base of her throat. Her fingers, closed around the helm, seemed to have grown an extra joint. Thin lips barely covered rows of what definitely was more teeth that could fit into a human jaw.

But the eyes she turned to Leia, though robbed of colour through the holo, were still human and so full of pain the General took an involuntary step back. She clutched at her heart, the stab of pain there half her own sympathetic grief and half Rey’s despair felt through the Force.

 _“You can’t help me,”_ she said. Even distorted with the transmission, the vowels of her speech were oddly shaped, as if her larynx could no longer modulate the sound waves properly.

_“I have to put an end to this.”_

“Rey.” Leia took a deep breath. “Snoke wants to use you. Whatever he’s offering, it’ll come at terrible price.”

 _“No,”_ Rey shook her head. _“You don’t understand. I’m going to destroy him. This - all that’s happening to me - it must have a purpose, right? I’m taking the Force from people. I will take it from him. He won’t hurt us anymore.”_

“Rey, don’t,” Finn pleaded. “The First Order is much stronger than you know. You don’t have to sacrifice yourself. We’ll find a way to help you. Don’t do this alone.”

She turned her gaze to him, and suddenly her eyes darkened. _“Still so afraid of them?”_ Her laugh bared her teeth in a mockery of mirth. A lighter gleam sparkled in her eyes, as if they were tinged with yellow. _“Fear them. Hate them. Make them suffer. Perhaps the Dark will give you the strength you need.”_

“Rey!” Luke exclaimed. “This is not the way I taught you.”

Rey laughed, and then cried out, clawing at her own face. When she lifted her head again, her eyes were completely dark, and a scar ran diagonally from her forehead across one eye down to her neck.

 _“You haven’t taught me many things, old man,”_ she sneered. Perhaps she wanted to say more, vicious and triumphant in the face if their horror, but then she convulsed again, whimpering and tearing at her hair. The flesh in her face knitted itself before their eyes, the scar disappearing. Her voice, when she next spoke, was shaking with fear, breaking like a young boy’s stammer.

 _“Help me, mother,”_ she sobbed.

Leia squeezed her eyes shut, wishing she could unhear that desperate plea. Rey had Ben’s memories but she wasn’t her son. Her son had forsaken her.

“I’m not your mother, child,” she whispered, heartbroken.

The not-Rey stared at them without a word for so long that Luke moved to check if the holo hadn’t frozen on a single frame. Then she blinked. Her eyes were back to normal, the only thing in the strange, skeletal face that reminded them of Rey.

 _“They’re coming,”_ she announced, voice colourless and dispassionate, as if she was relaying news someone else told her without fully understanding them. Then she ended the transmission.

The next second, alarms blared into chaos throughout the entire Resistance fleet.

“Multiple ships just jumped out of hyperspace!”

“Four - correction, five First Order capital ships, equipped with gravity wells, and multiple–”

“Incoming TIE fighters!”

Leia swore under her breath and began barking out orders. “Squadron leaders, move to intercept! All ships, take evasive action, there’s an asteroid field nearby that we can use as cover– for kriff’s sake, Luke, where do you think you’re going?”

Her brother barely stopped in the doorway.

“I don’t have the Force but I haven’t forgotten how to fly an X-wing.” And with a little apologetic smile, Luke was gone.  


	26. Extreme sports

In a few hours Hux recovered enough of his strength to walk on his own and not jump skittishly at every shift in the shadowy corners of the freighter. He took several fitful naps alternated with digging through the ship navigational and log computers. From what he could gain of her recent history, the ship had mostly operated around Wrea before it had been driven away from that system in a skirmish that had resulted in several hits to the ship’s hull, nothing too serious. Well. That answered the question where the Resistance fleet was at the moment. 

_ Audacity,  _ as Hux began to call it, contained four large cargo bays, spacious enough to store all the loot of the pirates’ previous endeavours. One of them was refitted into a docking bay for a Gthroc 690 - too big to serve as a proper shuttle and too small for a freighter; the same stopgap solution as the rest of the ship. A sloppy string of letters scrawled across the upper hull announced that its name was  _ Scavenger. _ Another cargo bay was split into smaller compartments that Hux recognised as the makeshift prison and interrogation cells they woke up in earlier. The sensors above doorway of one indicated something huge was still moving inside and if Hux sped up his pace when walking past, nobody needed to know. 

In the third one, Ren was currently training with the electrostaff. 

Hux stopped just behind the bay hatch and leaned against the wall, admiring the view. 

Ren went through the forms slowly at first, with attention to every move but lacking the flair that came with practice. He clearly knew the theory, perhaps had been given a basic training at some point, but a staff wasn’t his weapon of choice. Hux watched as Ren finished another routine, obviously still heavily impeded by his lightsaber habits. 

“You need to learn how to effectively use both hands.”

Ren huffed and straightened from his crouch. His undershirt clung to his back in wet patches. His hair was pulled away from his face and held in a messy braid, a clumsy imitation of the one Hux had put there earlier. Hux’s fingers itched with the urge to redo it properly. A drop of sweat fell from Ren’s brow and landed on the floor. Hux briefly contemplated the merits of a shower and then snapped back to present when his mind took a rather lewd turn. 

“I know,” Ren said eventually and sighed. “The combat forms I favoured usually required one hand free to use the Force.” 

Hux had seen Ren in battle before, slashing his way through the rows of enemy soldiers, blocking and deflecting blaster bolts as he went. Throwing men into the air, their bodies squeezed of breath before they hit the ground. Hux suspected that was part of the reason behind Ren's impressive pectorals and biceps. His lightsaber was difficult to wield, resistant to momentum, and he needed the arm strength to handle a heavy broadsword one handed. 

Of course, the possibility of using the Force was a moot point now. 

“Think of it as of a double-bladed lightsaber,” Hux suggested. Ren curled his lips in distaste and Hux suppressed a smile. He stepped away to watch Ren go through another round, the lunges and dodges smoother now, more precise. Getting the hang of it - or maybe just extra motivated to show off. Hux certainly didn't mind the view. 

The training was more than a passing fancy to kill the time - which they didn’t have to spare in the first place. Electrostaffs were designed for single combat against lightsaber-wielders. There weren’t many weapons in the Galaxy able to block a lightsaber strike. If they were to go against Snoke… 

Hux startled from his thoughts when the purple plasma arcs bound to the weapon’s end slashed directly in front of his face and stopped, swirling and crackling, pointed at the center of his chest. Above the deadly light, Ren’s face was smirking.

“Daydreaming?” The weapon powered off with a hiss. “Or just enjoying the show?” Ren’s voice dropped lower, one of his arms coming up to brace him against the wall Hux was leaning against. From this close, Hux could feel the heat radiating from his body, a delicious counterpoint to the chilly air of the room. Somewhere in the past, the General he’d used to be would be disgusted, crowded like this by a sweaty and overly snuggly beast of a man. Now he just subtly inhaled more of that smell, strong and musky, still fresh and with a hint of sweet jogan fruit they ate earlier. 

Keeping the act, Hux tilted his head, giving Ren one of his perfected cold evaluating stares. A bit ineffective at this distance and Ren’s mischievous grin was telling him that as a means of intimidation, it failed.

“I would ask for less aesthetics and more precision next time,” Hux lifted his chin with a smirk of his own. Ren pecked it right off his lips with a quick kiss, the smack of lips loud in the cargo bay. 

“But you like the aesthetics,” Ren rumbled, shifting even closer, his chest brushing against Hux’s. The thin, clinging fabric of his undershirt did nothing to conceal the peaks of his nipples, hardened by exertion, chilly air cooling his heated body, and arousal. 

Hux snapped his eyes back to Ren’s, finding them half-lidded and fixed on his mouth. Experimentally, he licked his lips. Ren’s eyes darkened at that, pupils fat and head tilting forward–

“Actually I came to tell you we’ll arrive on the orbit of Wrea in fifteen minutes,” Hux sneaked from under Ren’s arm, grinning when Ren’s whole body sagged, his forehead hitting the wall with a disappointed  _ thunk _ . 

“Tease.”

Hux stifled a laugh and ran his hands appreciatively up Ren’s spine and down his sides, dipping his fingers briefly under the waistband before gripping his hips and spinning him around, back to the wall and breathless surprise staring down on Hux. 

“Let’s see what I can accomplish in fourteen, then,” Hux purred, licked his lips and dropped to his knees.

 

*

 

_ Audacity _ dropped out of hyperspace, the turquoise and jade oceanic world of Wrea dotted with fluffy white clouds rotating peacefully beneath, and neither of the men paid it any attention. 

“What on Malachor...” Hux cursed quietly. Ren just stared. 

All around them, the orbit was littered with debris. The entire system was one massive wreckage. The torsos and wrecks of many ships rotated slowly as far as the eye could see, spitting sparks from bared circuits or already dark and dead. 

“It’s the Resistance,” Ren said quietly. 

“It’s what’s left of it,” Hux corrected him automatically. There was only one force stationed close that could bring on a slaughter of this magnitude. Hux couldn’t see any escape pods flying amongst the ruins. First Order didn’t take any chances, then. Extinguishing the whole fleet in one fell swoop.

Hux almost regretted he wasn’t there to watch - or better, to command it. But as he looked on, the evidence strewn in front of his eyes was making less and less sense. For starters, the battle obviously happened not so long ago, perhaps only hours - and yet there was no trace of First Order fleet. Nobody left behind to tractor-beam salvageable ships, no patrols looking for survivors. He could see a few shot down TIE fighters; that was all. 

Secondly, the destruction seemed overwhelming. Surely, First Order had a bone to pick with the Resistance over the loss of Starkiller. The starfighter pilots would enjoy taking down a couple of corvettes for sport. But this complete annihilation seemed like a rather extreme sport.

The question was, why? The Resistance fighters had been able to put a lot of wrinkles to Hux’s forehead in the past. What happened that they suddenly rolled over and let themselves be picked off like the fatstock for the slaughter? 

Ren activated the scanners and was searching, too: only he seemed to concentrate on the big ships, one after another appearing on the screen only to be dismissed with an ever deepening frown. 

“What are you looking for?”

“The command ship,” Ren muttered. “ _ Alderaan’s Pride. _ Organa’s flagship. It’s not here.”

The First Order could have tractor-beamed her ship away from the battlefield as a spoil of war, including the prized prisoner. Hux shook his head at the thought. Like Ren, he suspected Organa would rather self-destruct her ship than to let herself fall captive.

_ She could have jumped away _ , a suggestion appeared in Hux’s mind. When she saw the battle was doomed, their forces outnumbered, instead of going down with her fleet she could have chosen to save her own life. It would explain the disaster they were currently looking at. Only a fleet without its commander would panic, their actions directionless and hopeless. He took one look at Ren and decided to keep that thought for himself. 

“I’m picking up a life form signature signal,” Ren said suddenly. The scanner screen zoomed on one of the X-wings, floating aimlessly in space. It was damaged but the cockpit was still sealed and pressurized. The signal was weak. The pilot inside was probably dying from his injuries. 

“Take him aboard,” Hux decided. “Hopefully he’ll be able to tell us what the hells happened here.”


	27. Sandcastle contests

Luke woke up to a confusing softness of bed under his back and a rather disconcerting feeling of being stared at.

Flickering overhead lights, rickety sound of unkept engines, rust blooming in the corners of a small cabin - this was no military vessel. He flexed his hands - no shackles. Then he tried to roll his head and hissed when pain exploded from a spot at the base of his skull, sending black spots dancing in from of his eyes.

“Your helmet protected you from the worst but you still nearly snapped your neck,” a voice informed him. Even med droid in the sickbay used to have more compassion programmed into their speech patterns. Luke blinked a couple of times and then he slowly, carefully turned his head to look at the speaker.

The voice belonged to a man who looked as if he'd been through hell and back and yet put up a lot of effort into trying not to look like that. Sunburnt face with hollow cheeks lined with ginger beard and an odd mishmash of clothes, not all of them quite fitting. Voice raspy with an Outer Rim accent and lilting with an affectation that reminded Luke vividly of old Imperial officers. But the sharpest about this man were his eyes: clear and cold like frost over grass on late Autumn day, with all warmth carefully hidden underground. The only one left to shine was slightly disdainful curiosity, with which the man currently regarded Luke as if comparing him to some hypothetical image and had already found him wanting.

“You've cost me so much time,” the man said, chin resting in the cradle of his hands, elbows braced on the table. “So much grief. I lost my life's work to the idea of finding you. And when I finally stumble upon you, you're just an old man.”

Recognition blinked to life in Luke’s still fuzzy memory.

“You’re General Hux.”

“Just Hux, these days.”

More of recent events recrystallized into clarity and Luke had to take several deep breaths.

“Is Ben alive?”

“Is your sister alive?”

Luke sat up. The back of his neck was taped and the base of his skull fixed in a bandage. Effective and neat; he supposed he had to thank this disagreeable ginger for it. The murderer of billions was apparently a skilled medic. Luke didn’t appreciate the irony.

“Why do _you_ care? _He_ obviously doesn’t.”

Hux repositioned his hands - now his chin rested on the back of his intertwined fingers. His stare turned even more fascinated.

“Believe it or not, I don’t aspire to ever understand your family drama. I am merely trying to understand how could the bulk of Resistance fleet fail in battle so thoroughly they practically became a shooting target.”

“What if I want to speak with Ben first?”

Hux tilted his head, eyes still fixed on Luke. Not a glance towards the door or some partition, nothing that could give away that Ben was near, listening - if he was. Hux was too good at this. Luke doubted that he would have any chance at reading him even with the Force.

“It’s not within my powers to guarantee you that.”

Luke put his feet onto the floor and mirrored Hux’s pose, bracing his elbows on his knees.

“In that case, it’s completely within my powers not to tell you anything you want to hear.”

Hux suddenly grinned, sharp.

“Is it?”

The cabin door slid to the side and Ben - no, not Ben anymore, he was Kylo Ren now - strode in. Rather quickly.

“You wouldn’t,” he told Hux. He turned his face away for a moment and when his gaze returned to Hux, it was pained. Imploring.

“Please. You… haven’t seen yourself. Don’t use… _that_.”

Hux met him with a sneer that was as triumphant as it was bitter.

“I knew _this_ would get you in here. Now, can we continue?”

“What?!”

“Should I feel… threatened, somehow?” Luke put in sarcastically. This whole conversation felt like the sandcastle contests they used to hold on the Toshe station, he and Biggs and Laze with Camie, back on Tattoine. Everyone trying to one-up the other, the castles just a thinly veiled metaphor for their egos.

“I was merely trying to prove to your nephew that he doesn’t hate you as much as he should.” And now, Hux’s voice grew on a brittle edge. Kylo must have caught on it too because he abruptly knelt down to get eye to eye with Hux, wrapping his fingers loosely around Hux’s forearm.

“I told you, I’m not going back, Hux… I’m not going to betray you for him. But - hasn’t there been enough revenge? As you said. He’s just an old man now.”

Finally Kylo turned to him and Luke got his first clear look at the face of the child, now a grown man, who’d cost him so much heartbreak.

“She did to you what she did to me,” Kylo said without preamble, not really a question, obviously not expecting an answer either. “So much for another chosen one.”

 _Hasn’t there been enough revenge?_ The words echoed through Luke’s mind, circulating in disbelief. The boy who murdered his fellow students would never say that. Luke wondered what that change meant. If Leia had been right all along. That there was never the time to give up hope.

“Well, you’ve spoken,” Hux interrupted. “Can we get back to the battle?”

Luke rubbed at the loose end of one of the bandages that kept scratching at his neck when he talked.

“There’s not much I can tell, and very little I can explain,” he admitted. “We were waiting for Rey when she arrived to Wrea, and tried to convince her to come back with us. Then a fleet of First Order warships arrived - they must have been expecting us. The capital ships had gravity wells to block us from jumping away. We were outnumbered, outgunned, and Leia gave the order to retreat to the Smuggler’s Run - the asteroid field in the sector, from where we could find an opening… but then suddenly Rey’s ship jumped to hyperspace.”

“Despite the engaged gravity wells?”

Luke closed his eyes. The memory was still too jarring, too absurd. “It wasn’t just a jump. The whole space around her ship seemed to contract. It was as if she just… opened a wormhole around herself. She disappeared - and she pulled _Alderaan’s Pride_ with her. And then the space they were in just - imploded - and the ripples from it damaged every hyperdrive in the vicinity of it...”

“... which was the main part of the Resistance fleet,” Hux finished for him. “Without engine power, and without their General...”

“...it was a slaughter,” Luke finished grimly. “The X-wing squadrons tried to protect at least the escape pods. Our only luck was that the First Order fleet probably was given a command to go after Rey because all of a sudden they began jumping away. We have been done for anyway.  Commander Dameron took over and organized the last surviving vessels with functional engines to pick up the survivors and jump somewhere safe. My squadron stayed behind, covering our retreat, when I got hit. That’s all.”

Kylo shared a look with Hux.

“She can manipulate the space continuum,” Hux said slowly.

“And she took Leia to Snoke’s planet,” Luke added, stressing the words. “She wants to put an end to him, and she doesn’t care for collateral damage.”

“She won’t succeed,” Kylo said, voice dark. “Snoke is as powerful as he’s paranoid. His citadel is well protected.”

“She can literally move through dimensions,” Hux objected. “If there’s the slightest chance she might get through to him, we need to be there.”

Luke lifted an eyebrow. “You have the audacity to go against your Supreme Leader?”

Hux stood, slid forearm through the loose circle of Kylo’s hand still around it and intertwined their fingers together. Then he smirked.

“In fact, we have. You’re sitting in it.”

 

*

 

Snoke’s stronghold stood on a barren planetoid barely grasping onto its atmosphere. Several irregularly shaped moons followed its loose orbit around the system’s only star, a dying out red giant. A comet cloud marked the farthest reaches of this system and Hux intended to use it as a cover for their arrival. The last thing he planned was to jump in front of the turbolasers of the entire First Order fleet.

The last thing he expected was to find another ship graveyard littering the whole system, with only one intact vessel drifting aimlessly on the orbit.

Despite everything - the bounty on his head, the banishment and disgrace - Hux’s chest still tightened painfully at the sight. The destruction was even more mind-boggling than the last. Star destroyers, the pride of First Order’s fleet, floated defenceless and barely clinging to life support,  ripped apart or crippled with smaller vessels jammed and embedded in their hulls.

The last surviving TIE fighters were giving a wide berth to the lone Resistance flagship in the middle of the wreckage. Apparently at least their weapon systems were all right.

“Better let me on the coms before some trigger-happy Lieutenant gives this old girl a hello she won’t get over,” Luke suggested. Hux thought it was a sound idea.

 

*

 

Leia dashed to the bay as soon as the pirate freighter finished the docking procedure. Despite having heard Luke’s voice on the line, she couldn’t contain the rush of relief washing over her when Luke descended the ramp, alive and grinning.

“I should just get used to you always making it.” So little of her friends returned from their missions into her waiting arms these days. She clung to Luke as if her life depended on it.

“I wouldn’t have made it,” Luke shook his head and pointed behind himself. Leia looked over his shoulder and felt her heart stop.

Her son stood there, tall and haggard and worn down but still meeting her eyes with defiance. The Ben she'd sent to Luke had yet to go through his growth spurt - the man she saw now was so tall that he would have to kneel for her to hug him. Hug the man who killed Han. Tears welled up in her eyes, absurd and made out of ten different emotions. She felt ten different words bubble up her throat but none made it past her shock-frozen lips.

At last Ben nodded, stiff and impersonal as if they'd just met at a diplomatic table. “You’re welcome.” And with that - with just that - he turned to disappear back into his ship.

That finally loosened the knot on Leia’s tongue.

“Ben!”

She saw the clench of his fists but he didn't stop. If anything, he strode even more purposefully.

She made to go after him but suddenly she found her way blocked by another stranger - no, not a stranger. She knew this face, cruel and fanatical even under unkempt beard and grime.

“His name is Kylo. If you want him to talk to you, you should start using his chosen name.”

Leia regretted not wearing a blaster. Before she could get one and serve the Galaxy the justice it deserved, she would have to do with words.

“That’s rich coming from the man who gives out numbers to people instead of names,” she spat. Hux regarded her with cold, faintly amused smirk.

“Tell me, General, did you know by name every soldier who gave their lives for your ideals?”

The slap carried only half the force because she literally couldn’t reach, but stars was she willing to try again.

“That was for Kor Sella, to give you just one,” she hissed. “My envoy and a dear friend who died on Hosnia, along with billions of innocent people!"

Hux rubbed his cheek with the back of his hand, the infernal smirk growing even wider.

“How fortunate for her to be remembered, then. I was too young to remember the name of my mother who was left on Arkanis, to die at the hands of Rebels who ordered bombardment on a building full of children!”

“No.” Leia took a step back, straightening her spine and lifting her chin. “You don’t get to excuse genocide with the death of one person, however dear. The war was thirty years ago. Did you just decide to let people suffer for the sins of their fathers?”

“How ironic hearing this from a woman who’d sent her own son away for the sin of being too much like his grandfather.”

Leia grasped blindly for Luke’s shoulder and let the rage swell and fade, the presence of her brother calming.  She wouldn’t let this monster get under her skin. When she felt safe to open her eyes again, Hux was gone, replaced by the face of her brother, concerned and regretful.

“Leia… the Resistance fleet. They didn’t stand a chance. Did Rey… did she do all this, too?”

In all the heartbreak, the only comfort her mind latched onto was the thought of Finn. Brave Finn who sat at the turret cannons, tirelessly defending _Alderaan’s Pride_ and comming her approximately every two minutes, asking for news about Poe.

“Poe Dameron?”

“Commander Dameron is all right. He’s taking care of our survivors.”

“Good. At least something is good.” Leia sighed, and were it not for her brother’s support, she would have just slid down to sit on the floor, dignity be damned.

“Luke… Rey left. For the planet. She just… destroyed the entire Order’s fleet while we were reduced to watching. She compelled the weapons personnel of the ships to turn the cannons against their own. Moved the star destroyers to crash into each other. Some ships just collapsed and imploded with a flick of her hand. Then she said we weren’t allowed to go with her, and she set her course to the fortress. I don't know if we can stop her in time…”

“That’s why we have to team up, Leia. Theirs is the only operational transport.”

Leia stiffened. “I am not ‘teaming up’ with that man. I am not setting foot into his ship. It's only the hyperdrive that's damaged, we can still use sublight thrusters-”

“There’s a coolant leak all over the engines section, Leia. We can’t waste time with repairs.”

Luke took her hands in his own. Always so idealistic. Always so ready to forgive.

“What about we let the future carry out his judgment and focus on the here and now? I’m not asking you to forgive him. Though he did help me, and is quite protective of Kylo.”

Leia scrunched her nose at the name. “You too? His name is–”

“He’s not the boy you thought you knew… and maybe he never was,” Luke said wistfully.

“But, Leia. Rey might have taken more from him than just the Force. He used to be so prideful, so full of rage… I think there’s more compassion in him now than back when I wanted him to be a Jedi.”

“We don’t have to share air, General,” a voice laced with ironical contempt rang out above them. Startled, Leia looked up.

“This little bounty came with an extra,” Hux continued from his vantage point in the open hatchway of a Gthrog 690. With his words, the _Scavenger_ detached itself from the _Audacity_. Leia could glimpse the outline of her son behind the helm. The makeshift shuttle finished the turn and aimed for the hangar opening. Hux stepped back into it and let the hatchway slide shut. Before he entirely disappeared from their view, Leia saw him waving her a mock salute.

“See you on the planet side, bastard,” Leia gritted out through her teeth and went to assemble a crew.

 

 

 

 


	28. Party and fights

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sorry it's not "Pool party and water fights" but I really needed a fight between all parties in this story to happen in this chapter. So I tweaked the prompt slightly:)

Hux’s plan to get past Snoke’s security measures was quite simple. All it took was to follow the path of destruction left in Rey’s wake.

He expected shattered doors, smashed control panels and broken-through walls. He expected to find the elite guards dead, red masks squashed into their faces and limbs grotesquely twisted amidst the scraps of red robes.

He didn’t expect to find claw marks. It unnerved him. Had the scavenger girl conjured some beast out of thin air?

Ren had led them through the maze of halls and corridors at a swift pace, and every empty room they found seemed to spur him on faster. After a while, Hux could barely match his tempo without breaking into a jog.

“Slow down,” he hissed, breath coming short between the words.

Ren just shook his head, pointing mutely behind them. The echo of steps was faint but definitely there. Leia’s landing party wasn’t far behind.

As he was straining his ears to listen, he realised there were also noises coming from ahead. A garbled voice, and something like a low crackling hum...

Abruptly, Ren swerved them to the side, through a narrow corridor, up a flight of stairs and back down another. Then through a different corridor and through a cracked arch to-

It was the grand hall, Hux realised, taking a cautious peek from the shadows of the alcove opening into it. He’d never been here but he recognised the seat from their holo conferences with Supreme Leader. At the time, he used to think of it as of a throne. Now he realised how deceiving the illusion was. The seat was just one of many plain ones lining the walls like a circle of silent witnesses, and in it sat a rather disappointingly human sized Snoke.

_ And Ren, the bastard, never told me, _ Hux thought somewhat out of turn. But the laugh quickly died in his throat when he took in the other presence in the hall: a creature trapped in a column of pulsing force field.

It must have been the girl. It couldn’t have been the girl. Hux unconsciously groped for Ren's hand and squeezed it when he realised how terrifying the Force could be. When he imagined this could have happened to Ren.

The creature stood at almost twice the height of Snoke, dark, as if sun scorched skin stretched over twisted bones and knotted joints. Her clothes torn to mere rags hanging off her body, destroyed during the rapid growth. Hands and feet ending in sharp talons, lips too thin to hide all the teeth - and yet there was still something human about her dessicated face, the transformation incomplete and the more horrifying.

She raged inside her entrapment, clawing at the energy walls and convulsing in continuous shock. The trap prevented any sound from escaping and they could only imagine what was coming out of that wide open maw.

Snoke was lounging in the seat, bony hands folded contemplatively over his chest and a self-satisfied smile contorting he already disfigured face into even more repulsive shape. Unarmed, unprotected - it was almost too easy, to ready his gun and take aim, nobody would be able to deflect it from this distance, not even–

Hux’s finger froze over the trigger. Icy cold, immobilizing tendrils of bone-deep frost spread through his muscles, up the arm and around his ribs, squeezing and robbing him of breath. He couldn’t move. He couldn’t breathe.

“My traitorous General,” Snoke laughed, a low, dry sound that prickled like needles at the base of Hux’s skull. “You disappointed me. All those soldiers conditioned and programmed to lay down their lives for the First Order, and yet you couldn’t set an example yourself?”

Hux found he could speak, the forced stillness of his ribs lifting momentarily to let him gulp down a wheezy breath. In the shadows, he felt Ren’s hand move up to his: Covering his stiff and unresponding fingers, working to loosen Hux’s iron clutch on the gun, trying to pull the trigger for him. Hux hoped he could distract Snoke for long enough.

“My loyalty is to the First Order,” he choked out. “It’s you who had betrayed us.” Kylo almost had it. If only his hands weren’t so kriffing huge, trying to worm under Hux’s frozen fingers. Hux rambled on.  

“Your obsession with Skywalker cost us our most precious weapon, and now you’ve allowed this Force abomination to destroy the entire fleet just to get her to come to you–”

The rest of the words evaporated from his mouth with the explosion of pain behind his eyes. An invisible blow sent him gasping to the floor, flattening him against it as if the weight of the entire citadel rested on his back. The gun was yanked out from his grasp and clattered uselessly out of his reach.

“Kylo, my boy. Come out. You can’t feel me now but I never stopped sensing you. I’ve been waiting for you to return to me.”

This. The twitch of Kylo’s body towards the voice, the first instinctual reaction to obey before it was overridden with reason. This was what Hux should have been afraid of all the time, and what he foolishly forgot in his infatuation. How could he ever think that a few weeks of reluctant intimacy could ever mean more than a lifetime of grooming?

“I know how you feel,” the silky voice, so incongruous with the gruesome face, spun its lies.

“Abandoned, diminished. Forced to hide before your own Knights. Manipulated into thinking that the little you’ve been left with was going to be all you’d ever get.”

Hux’s heart was beating too fast to fit into the ever-tightening space in his chest, burning up his remaining oxygen. His thoughts stumbled from a race into a stutter, unable to focus on anything else than the slow loosening of Ren’s grip on his hand.

And then Ren let go of his hand entirely and stepped out of the alcove. Hux’s throat closed up. He wasn’t going to need the Force grip around his neck to finish him. He was going to choke on his own ambitions, and on misplaced trust.

“There you are,” Snoke smiled. Or at least, a half of his face did. “You think you’re lost? You’ve never been lost to me. And for your faith, I can give you back what you want most.”

Even through the black mist taking over his eyes, Hux could not miss the spark lighting up in Ren’s eyes. His precious Force. His power. Hux doubted Snoke could do that - but even if he could speak, reasoning with Kylo would be futile.  _ The Supreme Leader is wise _ , that used to be Ren’s favourite saying. It went beyond childish faith. Who knew what knowledge lay stored in the numerous holocrons and artifacts lining up the walls. If there was a way to get the Force back, Snoke would be the one to know it.

“No, you can’t.”

Fresh gasp of breath burned its way down Hux’s seizing lungs, making him curl on himself in a mixture of relief and agony, and then his blood curdled again when he realised it wasn’t Kylo who said that.

In the main doorway stood General Organa, blaster in hand, illuminated by the bluish light of a lightsaber in the hands of FN-2187.

She pulled the trigger.

It turned out Snoke  _ could _ deflect a blaster bolt, even from this close. The first one hit the ceiling, bringing a shower of stone dust on their heads, and the second one turned right in its path with a flick of Snoke’s hand and only narrowly got deflected by the traitor’s lightsaber, more by luck than skill from the way he held onto it.

“The ultimate test,” Snoke’s eyes gleamed with wicked pleasure. “It’s time for your end, last Jedi. All is exactly how I have foreseen it. Come, Kylo, and finish your training. Nothing will stand in our way.”

Kylo walked over to the wall as if in a haze, strides long and unwavering. He took down one of the trophy lightsabers and activated it. The bright yellow blade set a play of light across his face, making it look sickeningly akin to a mask. Hux’s heart thudded painfully in his chest and he watched the smaller man’s face go ashen, his grip on the blue lightsaber so tight it shook.

The blaster in Organa’s hand was trembling, too, its point sliding between the null chance at shooting Snoke and the perfect chance to shoot her own approaching son.

For one infinite second, Kylo seemed to lock eyes with the traitor, weighing him up. And then several things happened so fast that Hux’s slowing brain couldn’t quite make them apart.

Kylo swapped the lightsaber into his left hand and freed the electrostaff from the holster on his back, spinning on the spot and jumping high, throwing himself with both crackling weapons raised - on Snoke.

Only the first blow connected, the electricity briefly dancing over something hard and shiny hidden under Snoke’s robe before it shorted out. The lightsaber attack was blocked by Snoke’s own blade, green and shot through with red streaks as if it was bleeding.

Snoke rose from his seat, easily using the Force to push Kylo a few steps away before he returned with a new attack, wielding both the yellow blade and the staff, probably more like a distraction than an actual weapon. The former Stormtrooper yelled and joined the fray, and Snoke began to laugh.

“How degrading. My final duel, and it’s against an untrained whelp and a Forceless ingrate.”

The worst was, he was right. Even with the stray shots Organa managed to get in here and there, their efforts weren’t enough to cause Snoke any real harm. His reedy body moved with surprising agility, and what blows he couldn’t block, seemed to be neutralized by some kind of armor he wore under the flowy robes.

But then Hux realised he could move. The crushing weight from his body was gone. Slowly and spasmodically, as if every bone in his body had been broken, he began to make his way across the room.

A sharp cry - Kylo’s voice - locked up Hux’s limbs with dread. He whipped his head around, fear, purest and base, rooting his body to the floor. On the far side of the hall, the newly minted Jedi was kneeling, clutching the stump of his arm, and Kylo was swathed down by a strike of lightning springing from Snoke’s fingers.

“Beg,” Snoke hissed. “Beg me to make this swift.” Another flare of power seized Kylo’s body, lifting his back off the floor in a torturous arch. He was screaming, sparks coming out of his mouth, his hair lighting up in hundreds little flames.

Hux finally spotted his gun. Two more steps, two more painfully slow drags of his body across the floor, and he would have it. And yet he already knew it was too late, he was being too slow, nobody could survive this torture for so long–

Kylo’s body fell to the floor, released and limp, as Leia Organa threw herself into the path of the last lightning strike, knocking Snoke to the ground with nothing but the raw Force on her hands. She cried out, tendrils of energy contorting her own body, and fell to her knees, clutching at her chest. Snoke laughed again, lifting his hand, and Hux’s fingers finally touched the handle of his gun.

The panel controlling the force field around the trapped Force abomination went out in a shower of sparks under Hux’s first blast. At last, his marksmanship classes had paid off.

The energy walls fell and every molecule of air in the hall was suddenly replaced with a terror-inducing scream. It resonated within Hux’s skull, sharp and worming like the Force mind-read he always imagined would feel, and Snoke…

Snoke was being shredded to pieces. Hux didn’t even see the creature move over to him - she must have passed right through him on her way to Snoke and yet he didn’t feel her. But now her talons were digging under Snoke’s skin, cracking open his armor, picking out his bones. There was nothing human about her anymore. Her eyes shone with eerie light, white hair whipped around her skeletal head while she mindlessly tore Snoke’s body apart as if it was her only purpose in this universe.

And then, with a last blood-curdling shriek, she suddenly disappeared. The space around her flared up with light, like a ship jumping to hyperspace, before it collapsed on itself, air rushing into the place her body just occupied.

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> There's actually canon look to what Rey had transformed into: 


	29. Weekend on Scarif

Hux stepped off the ramp of his shuttle and loosened the collar of his uniform, breathing in the warm, slightly damp, fragrant air. It’s been so long he’d last set foot planet side. He never missed the burn of too much sunlight on his skin but there was something to be said about fresh, non recycled air.

With a wave of his hand, he dismissed the guards already falling into formation behind him. The men and women deserved some off time, too. Hux knew they wouldn’t get far - they were rather fiercely loyal in their duty - but the illusion was nice.

Scarif was so beautiful this time of year. Hux could almost fall for the illusion too, that he was here for nothing but a vacation. A little chill out time.

Chill and relaxed were the last two things Hux felt like right now. Closing his sweat-damp palms into fists, he made his trudging way across the white sand to a small cottage nestled in the sheltered bay. The front of the tiny house was taken up almost entirely by two windows overlooking the balmy shoreline and a doorframe crammed between them, and an even smaller bench containing a curled up figure of a man, knees drawn to his chin and staring at the sea.

Kylo didn’t look up when Hux’s shadow fell over his knees. But there was just enough room on the bench next to him for Hux to squeeze himself in, and he didn’t comment when Hux did just that. Their bodies touching from shoulder to hip, Hux deliberately mirrored Kylo’s position, drawing his legs up and wrapping his arms around his calves, his flawless cape and  pressed trousers be damned.

“I should have known you’d find me.”

Kylo’s voice was low and hoarse, as if he was unused to talking aloud. With the lack of neighbours for miles around, he probably was.

“Pity,” he continued when no witty retort was following. “I like the view here.”

Kylo Ren was always the worst liar.

“You hate the view,” Hux said dryly.

Ren sighed.

“You’re right. I hate it.”

Ren let his head fall to rest his brow on his knees, long waves of hair tumbling forward as if they could hide him from the world. Hux ran his fingertips through the strands, softly, fleetingly. He wouldn’t be more careful with a spooked animal. He was so glad he left his gloves in the shuttle. No matter how fine their leather was, nothing could compare with the silky flow of Kylo’s hair. He lifted a few strands and tucked them behind one big ear, exposing the cobwebs of silvery scarring covering the top of Ren’s cheek. The beard, thick and soft now, hid the rest. A permanent reminder of the Force lightning unleashed on him by Snoke. Ren rolled his head, tucking his face away from Hux’s eyes. But he wasn’t running away. Yet.

“Is this why you hid yourself from me? Mourning your pretty face?” Hux asked, carding his fingers through Ren’s hair more insistently now. Trying to get him to look back. Look at him.

“Did you really think I wouldn’t want you because of this?” he whispered, already afraid of the answer.

Because Ren wasn’t vain, he never minded his many scars, not even the one bisecting his face. And Hux was afraid that Ren would say,  _ No, I knew you wanted me still but I had to go away because I didn’t want you. _

 

_ * _

 

Hux still remembered the moments right after Snoke’s death, forever etched in his mind. They kept coming back to wake him every night, leaving him aching and shivering in the small hours of the day cycle, cold and alone.

Himself, sprawled on the floor of the grand hall, his body a cacophony of pain which he barely registered over the overwhelming relief. They did it. They made it. Snoke was dead, and they lived, and Kylo - Kylo was free–

Kylo was sitting on the floor, singed hair falling over pink-burned face, rocking the body of his mother in his lap. Her hand was still clutched over her heart, fingers locked in a spasm and already turning blue.

“I protected you from him in the end...” she was struggling to get the words out. “I… did.”

“You did,” Kylo confirmed, gentle, so gentle. Pressing a kiss into the crown of her greying hair.

“I’m sorry I couldn’t do it sooner. Ben...” Her breath was slowing down, every intake shorter and shallower than the last. “Come home, Ben. Please, come home.”

She died before Kylo could give her an answer.

Hux staggered over to him, pain shooting up between his ribs on every breath. He ignored it, ignored the screaming protests of his joints when he wrapped his arms around Kylo, burying his face in the smell of leather and scorched skin and tears.

“It’s over, Kylo. It’s over.” All the hiding, the misery, the hunger and constant fear… it was over.

“Yes, it is,” Kylo agreed, exhausted beyond any emotion. Just a flat voice, stating the truth.

 

*

 

And now, almost a whole standard year afterwards, Hux was exactly where he imagined himself to be, back when all this madness started. When he still believed Ren would one day get his powers back and Hux would be left alone. Well. Ren never got the Force back. But still he left.

“Why, Kylo. Just tell me why. Didn't you promise to stay with me till the end?”

Kylo turned his head, mouth turned down into unhappy pout, eyes accusing.

“I did. We brought down Snoke. You could get back your rank, your ship, your… home. That  _ was  _ the end. There was never… anything for me, beyond that.”

He made to get up but Hux's hand in his hair stopped him. Not really pulling, just… stroking. Calming. Hux could feel Ren’s shoulders trembling, leaning ever so slightly towards him.

“Kylo...you incomparable idiot. That was only the beginning.”

And it had been. The beginning of the whirlwind of a future that started taking shape in the grand hall of the ravaged citadel, growing like an improbably perfect crystal out of the puddle of Snoke’s blood.

Even though the start had been painful and cumbersome. It turned out that Snoke’s Force crush had literally broken almost every bone in Hux's body. His recovery was slowed down by the sheer amount of work that needed to be done, and stubborn unwillingness to let anyone else do it for him.

The remnants of the First Order were disheartened by the practical annihilation of their forces in the pursuit of Snoke’s personal interests and gladly welcomed the news of his demise. Hux, in turn, made good use of the strategic knowledge stored at the Citadel and of his newfound popularity. Rebuilding the First Order from ruin and securing its place on the political landscape of the Galaxy was so exhausting that Hux barely saw his bed in the first months, let alone noticed the emptiness of it.

The former Stormtrooper, now calling himself Finn, paid for the encounter with the loss of his saber hand, but not his spirit. He apparently got to keep some of his latent Force abilities, similar to those of the late General Organa, and just like her he threw himself into politics. With his hero status and with the charismatic Resistance pilot at his side, Finn quickly won over the hearts - and more importantly, the votes of the New Republic citizens. Over the course of the year, Hux had met his former subordinate many times at the diplomatic table. Though the animosity never disappeared, they were political rivals in a civilized time of peace, and so they both behaved as such.

One of Hux’s first edicts as the new Supreme Leader was declaring a quarantine over Malachor. The Knights of Ren were to be left alone, studying their mysterious Force and what was left of it in the Galaxy. With the mess the Force had caused over three generations, everyone agreed that matters of state and religion should be forever kept separate.

Nobody ever discovered what happened to Rey or who she even was in the first place.

“I have heard legends of beings like her, from the spacers on the farthermost routes,” Skywalker said later. “They are said to live in another dimension, incorporeal beings of pure Force, believed to be a creation of the ancient Sith. They would appear onboard of ships travelling through hyperspace and attack any Force sensitive they could find. Starweird, the spacers called them.”

“But I never heard of a human transforming into another species, let alone Starweird.”

Skywalker shrugged. “Perhaps one of them left a part of themselves in a human instead of killing them. Perhaps she was the result of some experiment of Palpatine - he used to search for ways to create the perfect Force sensitives for his Empire. We shall never know.”

The former Rebel hero and Jedi guru had chosen neutrality in the new order of things and he and Hux had formed a strange sort of almost-amicable understanding. If Luke thought he was doing the universe a favour by having some influence over the soon-to-be Emperor, Hux let him think that.

He asked Skywalker about Kylo once. After all, this was a man who holed himself up on an island for almost a decade. Perhaps it ran in the family.

“You’ll find him once he lets himself be found,” Skywalker shared one of his exceptionally unhelpful advices and said no more.

Of course Hux found him in the end, and here they were now, once co-commanders, once enemies, once lovers. Ren was giving him another of his unhappy looks, this time downright resentful.

“I wasn’t exactly hiding, you know. You could… if you had really wanted...”

Oh, but Hux missed even this: feeling angry around Kylo Ren.

“Well forgive me for giving you the time you seemed to need! How was I to know you would’ve come back if I asked?”

“What? You  _ would _ have asked? Why did you think I left?”

“I– don’t know!” Hux exploded. “To fulfill your mother’s dying wish, probably!”

As soon as the words were out of his mouth, Hux wished to take them back. But now his secret was in the open -  _ this _ was what he had feared the entire year. Why he had not searched as thoroughly as he could. He was afraid that once he would find him, it wouldn’t be Kylo anymore.

Kylo stared at Hux as if he’d grown two heads, and then his face darkened. Oh, he was angry with Hux. Finally something else than that cowardly resignation.

“You - when we - when we  _ started _ , remember what you said? ‘Attraction born from lack of other options.’ That’s what we were to you. Now you have other options, Hux. Plenty of them. I didn’t want to be around when you’d realize that… that...”

“Oh for fuck’s sake!” Hux slid down from the bench to kneel in front of Kylo, gripping his face with both hands, eyes roaming over those stupid soft lips and expressive eyes and every scar a thing to be honoured, worshipped.

“I said those words half-drunk, about to fuck a man after over six years of just myself for company, and twice as long since having someone I actually  _ cared _ about - forgive me for saying the first nerfshit that came to mind instead of spoiling everything with the truth!”

“...and the truth being…?” Kylo dared to ask, tentative, dazed by the outburst.

Fuck. Hux felt his throat close up. Hours and hours of negotiations and Senate speeches and yet he couldn’t get out three simple words.  

“Can’t I just show you?” he whispered. “Because  _ you _ left  _ me _ , and this is actually my first vacation in a year, and I really want to kiss you now.”

Kylo was smiling, and  _ fuck _ Hux was really done for when he felt the sting of salt in his eyes at the sight of Kylo’s smile. Stars, he missed it so much.

“But you will tell me,” Kylo leaned in, big hands coming up to ruffle Hux’s immaculately brushed hair.

“Make me,” Hux breathed and closed the distance.

 


	30. What about staying at home?

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This chapter is rated E. Definitely.

Hux fervently hoped his guards actually heeded his command to dismiss because Kylo Ren’s hut had only one room. At least it had a nice double bed, sturdy-looking enough for what Hux had in mind. Hux backed Ren to it, probably breaking his record in getting out of his uniform and making short work of Ren’s clothes, too.

Ren had kept in good shape. Hux’s mouth watered as he took in the broad shoulders, wide chest, thick thighs and everything in between.

With a hand against Ren’s chest, he pushed him down onto the bed and crawled up and  over him on all fours.

“You have promises to keep,” he announced and kissed him, hand sliding down to cup Ren’s rapidly hardening cock. Ren broke the kiss with a groan.

“About that,” he mumbled, looking away guiltily. “I… don’t have enough lube to prepare you properly.”

Hux followed Ren’s gaze to the bedside cabinet. The top of it was buried under a mess of various odds and ends, amongst them a nearly empty bottle of lube.

“Been busy, hm?” he remarked. Perhaps Ren had neighbours after all, ones that didn’t mind the long walk.

“Lonely,” Ren corrected him, a touch of color rising to his cheeks. “I… missed you, Hux.”

“And now you have me, and I’m not settling for anything less than the full show,” Hux grinned and climbed off him, walking back to where his clothes ended up on the floor. Quick fumble through the pockets of his pants and he found it. Marching victoriously back while in the nude must have looked ridiculous but Kylo didn’t seem to mind, eyes half-lidded and mouth open on a soft _oh_ as he lounged on the pillows, thighs parted, his lap the perfect seat. _In a minute_ , Hux promised himself and squeezed a generous amount of lube onto his fingers.

Tossing the tube aside, he straddled Ren’s lap, steadying himself with one hand on his shoulder. Kneeling with his thighs this wide put a strain on his muscles that would soon turn into burn but he knew he wouldn’t need that long. He reached a slicked hand behind himself and after a moment felt Ren’s hands joining in, sliding up and around, stroking along the undercurve of his buttocks, a curious fingertip dipping where Hux’s fingers worked. Hux couldn’t keep the smug grin out of his face when Ren’s eyes widened in surprise, his finger sliding in almost to the second knuckle. Hux sighed at the added stretch. So good. Better than he could imagine.

“Been busy yourself,” Ren not-quite asked, something else tackled onto the words that was quickly swallowed down. His mouth tightened, corners turning down a bit even as his fingers kept exploring, two sliding in and out in counterpoint to Hux’s own rhythm. No doubt trying not to imagine how many _other options_ fucked Hux in the past year to get him this accustomed.

“Literally,” Hux gasped when Ren’s fingertip grazed across his prostate. He could never quite reach himself. “With myself, I mean,” he clarified. “You promised me some-ah! Some other time, and then you left - oh fuck, there - and I had to make the most fucking awkward purchase of my life–”

He could see the lust filling Ren up, the color rising to his cheeks, the quickening of his breath. Hux couldn’t suppress a short giggle at the memory of himself stalking through the corridors to pick up his order because the shipping company didn’t have a kriffing ounce of discretion– and then he cried out, vision sparking, throbbing pleasure spreading from his nipple caught between Ren’s fingers. His back arched on its own, trapped between the two points of stimulation, pushing his chest directly into Ren’s face and deepening the angle of their joined fingers in his ass and fuck, it was going to be over before he was ready.

“Tell me about it,” Ren breathed, rolling the nub of Hux’s nipple in one hand and his lips hovering above the other. He stuck out his tongue, giving it the briefest tease. Hux thought about yanking him closer by the hair but that would mean losing his support, and his legs trembled so badly now that he was afraid he’d collapse.

“Tell me.”

“I’d fuck myself with it every week,” Hux growled. Nearly bit through his lip when Ren’s lips closed around his nipple and sucked, tongue playing with the peak. “I’d think about your mouth on me, getting me open and slick and ready, and I’d imagine it was you, filling me up, stretching me- ah, yes, - so wide, fucking me until I’d fall asleep with exhaustion because–”

He stopped himself just in time. This wasn’t the moment for _because sleep wouldn’t come without you there_. Ren fortunately didn’t mind the unfinished ramble, quite the opposite, with the way his mouth was devouring Hux’s chest and his fingers fucked into Hux’s hole, possessively and greedily. Ren’s cock jutted up between them, hot and hard and Hux used the rest of the lube in his palm to slick it up, giving it a few strokes. Ren’s stomach muscles rippled as he leaned back, intent on watching.

Hux let his eyes flutter closed. This was the hardest part, nothing could quite prepare him for the real thing, for the way the head of Ren’s cock felt so huge against his rim. Hux breathed out and eased down, feeling the breach and the clench - and Ren’s whimper at that - and then the give of his muscles as he relaxed, dropping down another couple of inches. His thighs trembled uncontrollably and his lungs felt too small for all the air he needed to get in. His whole awareness narrowed to the point of connection, nerves screaming on the line between _so good_ and _too much_ and–

Big hands rubbing up and down his thighs, soothing, and soft lips dropping light kisses all over his furrowed brow and squeezed eyes, words – _amazing, beautiful, so beautiful, doing so well_ – like a gentle murmur over the ringing of static in Hux’s ears. And then the hands slid up to his hips and gripped and lifted him up, just a little, before dropping him down, and again, and again… oh, that was good. So much better.

 

 

 

He managed to open his eyes and look at Ren and then he almost wished he hadn’t because the sight was enough to push him dangerously close to the edge. Ren’s whole body was taut, fighting to hold still, strong arms lifting Hux up and pulling him down onto his cock seemingly with no effort. His eyes were wide and hungry, dark and hazed over with lust, fixed on where his cock disappeared into Hux’s body as if he couldn’t believe it was happening. That Hux was here, in his dingy cottage, naked in his bed, body stretched around his cock.

Hux’s head was spinning. Dimly he recalled the guards and hoped that if any still felt the need to guard his safety, they’d have the common sense to do it out of hearing range because there was no way he could keep quiet right now. He moaned and gasped and screamed his pleasure and frustration over the injustice of a whole kriffing year between now and the last time he had Ren between his legs and he was never getting off him now, he was never going to let him disappear again–

“Yes, yes,” Ren growled into his mouth and Hux froze. Was he yelling that? All of that? Then the grip of Ren’s hands on his hips tightened and that was the only warning Hux got before he was flipped over, back hitting the mattress and legs high in the air and Ren looming over him, a beast let loose from his cage.

The thick head of Ren’s cock slid right back in and he set up a unforgiving rhythm, long rolling thrusts of his hips so hard that each one slid Hux a little bit up on the sheets. He braced both arms above his head, using the headboard for leverage against the onslaught, bearing down onto Ren’s cock and _oh yes right there!_ He screamed again, his neglected cock twitching where it lay red and heavy over his stomach.

Ren fucked him in earnest now, thighs slapping against Hux’s ass and every deep hard thrust aimed for that one spot sending flashes sparkling behind Hux’s eyelids. His skin felt as if he was going to spontaneously combust, electric sparks shooting up his spine and heat gathering low in his belly. He was babbling now, an incoherent litany of curses and _yes_ and _more_ and some other nonsense that he didn’t even hear over the blood roaring in his ears. Ren’s thrusts sped up, short frantic jabs of his cock deep inside him, and then his hand closed over Hux’s cock and stroked, tight and fast, too much of everything and Hux’s world turned white.

He came harder than he came in a year, and maybe harder than he could ever remember coming, his back curled, every nerve singing, so good it hurt. And he kept coming, another spurt of come splattering over his chest, this peak shorter but somehow more intense than the first, and his muscles were cramping and he was going to black out and he didn’t want it to stop, ever. Ren kept on fucking him through it, his rhythm stuttering and back arching until he finally tensed, buried deep and still, face scrunched in pleasure. Hux could feel him twitch, the warm spurt spilling inside him, and then Ren’s arms gave in and he flopped down, rolling onto his side in the last moment so that Hux wouldn’t get crushed under him. He lay there, gasping for breath for a minute, and then pulled Hux close for a sloppy kiss.

The wet squelching sound of Ren’s cock pulling out followed by the trickle of sticky come down the cleft of his ass was not something Hux was ever going to enjoy about sex but for now he didn’t have enough breath to complain. Ren was still lying half atop of him, legs tangled and lips sucking lazy kisses into the skin of Hux’s neck.

“I’m glad you kept the beard,” he muttered. “I like the color. It’s a bit different from your hair. I like that.”

Hux huffed. Then winced. “My leg is cramping,” he complained. Ren, the absolute asshole, lifted only as much as Hux needed to shuffle from under him and then flopped back down, heavy and boneless.

But then he began kneading Hux’s aching muscles with his big fingers and Hux was inclined to forgive him the laziness. After all, he did come here with his expectations set purposefully low, and instead got the most spectacular fuck of his life.

“Did I convince you?” he asked lightly, trailing his finger along the twirling patterns of scars amidst the dark cover of hair on Ren’s stomach.

“To come back with me,” he clarified.

Ren was giggling now. “I can’t believe you came here to negotiate my return with nothing but a tube of lube in your pocket.”

Hux lifted one shoulder in a half-shrug, pursing his lips. “I know what I want.”

“What if I said I was staying?”

Hux splayed one hand over Ren’s pectoral. It didn’t even cover the entirety of it. Amazing. He could feel the steady beat underneath, _thud thud thud_.

“We could still have fucked,” he pointed out. Ren snorted, letting his eyes fall shut.

“And then you’d have gone back home?”

Hux would almost mistake the tightness in his voice for tiredness if he didn’t know him so well. He took a deep breath.

“Then I’d have stayed here with you,” he said. “I would,” he repeated, locking his eyes with Kylo’s now wide open gaze. Willing the message to come across.

“Because _you are_  my home, Kylo. That’s what I learned during that year without you. Not the ship I abandoned, not the Academy I burned down myself, not any palace I’ve built without you. You ruined me, do you understand? I can’t sleep when you’re not there. So that’s that. You are coming with me or I’m staying here. Either way, I’m not losing you again.”

He expected surprise. Joy. Maybe a kiss. Instead Kylo just kept looking at him, a little dumbfounded pout to that mouth, doubt in his eyes.

“So I’m just… helping you get a good night’s sleep?”

“Oh for fuck’s sake, have it your way!” Hux exploded. “I love you, all right?”

Kylo, the absolute, terrible asshole, grinned.

“There. Was it so hard?”

Hux gaped. Then he jammed his elbow between Ren’s ribs. It would have better effect if he wasn’t so well fucked his muscles have turned to jelly.

“You’re so lucky I love you,” he grumbled.

Kylo’s grin grew even wider. “I know.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Y'all owe the illustration in this fic to the amazing @generaldeepthroat over on Tumblr who agreed to turn my awful lineart into a work of art with their light and shade. I love it.


	31. Sweet summer nights under the starry canopy

For their first five yearly vacations, Hux insisted they spent them in the same cottage on Scarif he’d found Kylo in. Mainly because Kylo really hated the view, which in Hux’s eyes constituted a sufficient punishment for Ren’s year of disappearance, and secondly - it made Kylo especially determined not to leave the bed the entire week and that was the main purpose of the whole vacation business, if you asked Hux.

Of course, on the fifth summer he slipped and accidentally gave away how much he hated sand. Kylo crowed in triumph.

“I knew it was just pretty words,” he laughed in Hux’s face as he carried him over the sand into the water.

“I haven’t talked ugly to you in five years so you’ll have to be more specific,” Hux informed him, clinging to his neck in case Kylo had the idea of dropping him ass first into the hateful grainy material.

“When you told me you’d have stayed here with me. Big words.” Kylo was treading into the sea now, surf splashing around his ankles. His voice was teasing, easy grin on his lips, no reproach there. Of course, he watched Hux enough times, giving soaring speeches in the Senate and laying down weighty promises tailored specifically to the ears of those he needed to sway onto his side. Of course he’d think everything was just rhetoric exercise to Hux.

“I meant every word,” Hux told him. Arms still tight around Kylo’s neck even though they were waist deep in water now.

“Hux.” Kylo stopped, feet planted wide, gazing down on Hux with a gentle smile on his face. The late afternoon sun was reflecting off the water and making his eyes shine like pure amber.

“You were the Supreme Leader of the First Order back then, and already working on establishing the Empire. Don’t tell me you’d give up on all that to live in a small seaside cottage with me.”

“Why would I have to give up on anything?” Hux asked with mock indignance. “I’d simply move the capital to Scarif. This place could do with better infrastructure anyway. I would've had a nice paved road built from the Imperial Tower to your small seaside cottage–”

Kylo dropped him into the waves.

When Hux resurface, spluttering and wiping saltwater out of his eyes, Kylo was already twenty feet ahead, strong arms and powerful legs propelling him through the water like some sort of merman. Well, very hairy merman. Hux grinned and set out after him. There was one reason to love Scarif after all: he finally got to teach Kylo Ren how to swim, and it turned out Kylo loved it.

Of course, after this revelation Kylo insisted on choosing the next vacation destination himself. Feeling particularly generous after his third orgasm that day, Hux agreed he may.

Kylo, the absolute _prick_ , chose Hoth. Hux vowed never again to make decisions while high on endorphins.

At least it was so bloody cold on Hoth that Kylo couldn’t reasonably complain against spending the entire week snuggled in bed. Stars knew they needed it.

Kylo had resisted the idea of co-ruling at first. He had some deeply rooted convictions about the singularity of the throne.

“If you can’t indulge me, think at least of that half of the Galaxy who’d love to see someone with Republic heritage wearing the crown,” Hux told him.

“But. The Empire needs someone who knows what they’re doing. That’s you, Hux. You’ve been preparing for this your whole life.”

“Yes, the Empire needs me, and I need you. Is that so hard to understand?”

In fact they didn’t wear crowns, that would be a bit silly and frankly uncomfortable as hell. But Kylo never looked better than in the black uniform with red-gold accents matching those on Hux’s white one, and what looked good on the holos, was fine with the majority of the Galactic citizens, exactly as Hux predicted.

Of course the ascension of the Empire wasn’t smooth sailing all the way. The ‘Remember Hosnia’ movement was especially loud in those first years of Hux’s campaign, and there was even a tribunal held on Chandrila which Hux agreed to stand in front of, much to everyone’s surprise. He _was_ the mind behind the Starkiller and never denied it. But in the end the solemn testimony of several First Order officers, and most importantly the communication logs retrieved from Snoke’s citadel, confirmed that the ultimate order to _use_ the weapon had come from Snoke. The fact that Hux had defected from the First Order immediately after that and had his hand in the demise of the unlamented Supreme Leader Snoke further cemented the story. But what had really swayed the sentimental masses onto Hux’s side was the leaked news of his secret marriage to the son of the late General Organa.

Finn Dameron wasn’t buying it for a second and Hux didn’t expect him to. Having a strong opposition in the person of the Senate’s Chancellor was challenging and added the stamp of credibility to every law Hux managed to pass through the Senate.

Kylo Ren’s relationship with Finn resembled two cats sitting on either side of a bathtub and neither willing to dip a single hair into the water to cross it. So when Finn had visited him on the last night of his chancellorship - he wasn’t going to be re-elected for the third time - Ren had been surprised.

“It’s up to you now,” Finn told him. “To keep him in check.”

Ren smiled into his glass of Corellian. “You think he still needs that?”

“I never could unsee the General in him,” Finn admitted. “That heartless superiority revelling in command of thousands of nameless, programmed puppet-troopers. I was waiting for that to come out.”

“It’s taken me a while to see through that myself,” Ren admitted. “But what made you trust _me?_ ”

Finn lifted his chin. “Leia Organa.”

Ren rose from his chair, refilled his glass and then just stood there for a long while, frowning into it. In the end, he put it onto the table untasted, and turned to Finn, folding his arms over his chest.

“Because she laid down her life to save me, you thought I was worthy?”

Finn never learned the finer aspects of his Force abilities but he could sense Ren’s distress. He kept silent, expecting there was more to what Ren wanted to say.

“Because I wasn’t.”

“You weren’t _then_.”

“You were the son she wanted,” Ren blurted out. Finn looked up sharply. In all those years, he never thought that the reason for Ren’s reservations towards him could be something as petty as jealousy. For stars’ sake, since he defected from the First Order, he barely spent a week at Organa’s side in total…

“The one who renounced ‘evil’ and chose her side. The one who had the Force but not too much, not too dark, just like her. The one who wielded my grandfather’s lightsaber with Luke’s blessing.”

Finn sighed. This was all in the past. They had to get over it, each in their own time, and carry on with their lives.

“It was Rey’s,” he reminded Ren. “The lightsaber. It called to her. I think that was the trigger to whatever awakened in her. We all owe this–” he waved his hand to encompass the room, the Imperial Tower, the trillions of people living peacefully in the Galaxy, “–to her. To her sacrifice.”

Ren nodded, slowly and somewhat calmed down. “You still miss her.”

“It’s hard not to,” Finn laughed weakly. “In my heart of hearts, I can still feel her. She’s out there, somewhere. I can’t sense if she’s happy or sad. I hope she’s beyond either.”

Luke Skywalker spent months traversing far space routes at random, searching for her. With him no longer Force sensitive, it was not likely the Starweird would take any interest in him. But when he returned, he’d been hopeful. He hadn’t met her but he’d heard stories that started percolating among the spacers. That the Starweird now had a new queen.

After all, everything Rey ever wanted was a family. And it seemed that somewhere amongst the Galaxy’s starry canopy, she’d found her own.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> That's all. That's the end of summer of 2017 for me. 
> 
> Can't believe this story evolved in such a way, considering the light-hearted list of prompts I started with. But in the end I just followed what seemed natural for the characters. 
> 
> Please don't blame me for Leia dying. That one was actually inspired by Carrie Fisher herself - when she said about Episode VIII "It's about family." That the whole Star Wars always were about family. I thought about how Vader died. So I gave her that, dying the way she lived, for hope. 
> 
> Somehow the crux of this story became a theme of home. Losing one, finding another. Even for my version of Rey. 
> 
> I hope you enjoyed this journey with me. I certainly did.

**Author's Note:**

> For more Star Wars nonsense, occasional art and writing updates [check out my Tumblr:)](https://sinningsquire.tumblr.com/)


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